Happy Reformation Day

Reformation Day: Thomas Cranmer

I thought I would use this opportunity to prematurely honor the church calendar of All Saints Day (which is Nov 1) and Reformation Day (October 31) in honoring a saint I have come to appreciate and love in the past year. This man was Thomas Cranmer.

Cranmer rose to the position of Archbishop of Canterbury during the reign of Henry VIII. Cranmer by that time had secretly married a German Lutheran girl, whose religious sympathies he shared. As Henry VIII called for a break with Rome, for fairly expedient and selfish reasons, Cranmer used the opportunity to bring Reformation principles to England. Traditionalists argued for keeping the Medieval Roman Catholic nature of doctrine in England, but Cranmer slowly and unperturbed fought for Reformation theology.

Imagine an era of the church when people came to a church service and could not read or understand the Latin service. What was worse was, these people were the clergy. It came to Cranmer’s attention how the clergy were left extremely uneducated, and he undertook the composition of the Book of Common Prayer, to educate the clergy and allow the worshippers to understand what was happening, being prayed and said in the service. Cranmer also wrote 42 articles of religion, 39 of which became the confession of the Anglican Church, including affirmation of justification by faith only, and the inefficacy of free will to save man.

After Edward VI died, Bloody Mary Tudor took the throne, and undertook her campaign to rid England of Protestantism. High on her enemies list was Thomas Cranmer. Cranmer was imprisoned and tortured until he recanted his faith, signing a document of recantation. His Catholic tormentors led him to make his recantation public. But when Cranmer was placed in front of the crowd, he instead preached salvation in Christ alone and renounced the Catholics. For reward, Cranmer was led to the stake to be burned. As the fires were lit, Cranmer extended his right hand, exclaiming that he wished it would burn first, for it had betrayed him.

Cranmer was a man that slowly plodded the soil for the gospel in England. The task required patience, diplomacy, and grace. His legacy? If you are an English speaking Protestant, beit Anglican, Baptist, Presbyterian, or whatever, you should take a minute to thank God for Thomas Cranmer, without whom, you may still be without the meat of the gospel.

Why I cannot be Roman Catholic (Part 4): I believe Mary is the Theotokos

My summer free time reading has been filled with Historical Theology. In reading the history of doctrine, I noticed I had a blind spot: Mary. My attention to Mary, mother of Jesus, only consisted in the fact that she was a virgin when she gave birth to Jesus. Beyond that, what was there to learn from her? Soon, I realized there was much to learn from her.

First, what did it mean that she was the mother of Jesus? In the Christological debates asking about the deity of Christ, the most orthodox thing to say about Mary was that she was "Θεοτόκος" (Theo=God, tokos=bearer). This does not mean Mary is "God the Mother” (as I heard one person attack the term), but that Mary is “God-bearer.” This title contains the baffling paradox, that a teenage single mother carried inside her the One who created her, Who created the earth she walked on and the universe in which that earth hung. The Creator was held in a creature.

Second, I had to learn that Mary was supreme in her commitment to Jesus. Before any signs, Mary knew her son’s mission, commanding others to do “whatever he says” at the wedding in John 2. Mary was there at the beginning of Christ’s ministry, and even at the end at the cross in John 19:25-27, even when the “great” disciples had run off. Though Mary may have had a lapse of judgment back at the temple in Jesus’ youth (leaving him, then scolding him), Mary was committed to her son’s adult ministry from start to finish. Christ’s mother and earthly authority was supremely submissive to her Son’s authority and duty.

Throughout my studies, I found Mary to be someone of honor in the early church, and continuing in the Eastern Orthodox tradition, who lifted up Mary as a supreme example of holiness, and I had to agree: Mary was the Theotokos and truly a saint worthy of imitation.

That was until my reading encountered the post-Thomas Aquinas Latin church. During Thomas’ time, a new teaching arose that declared that Mary was conceived immaculately herself. Both Thomas Aquinas and Bernard of Clairvaux opposed this new teaching, for if she was conceived this way, and born without original sin and herself was sinless, then she also would need no redemption, and all humans need redemption, even the mother of the Redeemer.

The Latin Church, however, pushed a noble honor of Mary into idolatry. They changed the accepted interpretation of Scripture. Originally, Proverbs 8:22-31 had always been interpreted as pointing to Christ, the wisdom of God (see the debate with Arius). Now Mary was the wisdom of God according to Nicholas of Cusa. Richard of St. Lawrance could even insert Mary’s name into John 3:16 - “that Mary so loved the world that she gave her only son” …Mary was “my only hope” [Thomas a Kempis] and exercised “maternal authority over God.” [Gerson] Finally, Mary could be “adored as God” according to Nicholas of Cusa, a mediatrix between Christ the Mediator and humanity. Despite the honor given to writers like Thomas Aquinas and Bernard of Clairvaux who opposed some of this, the cult of Mary dominated the scene. The paradox of a creature carrying God, became herself the god of many.

Despite my deference to the development of the treatment of Mary in the East, even to the point of not finding the “ever-Virginity” of Mary to be a doctrine worth fighting over for those who hold it, yet the Latin Church went beyond the bounds of devotion. Saints make up a “great cloud of witnesses” but their primary job is to be witnesses. The lives of the saints abound in rich treasures of contextual gospel living, worship and devotion, but if their actions do not point upward, they are distractions. God shares his Glory with no one, and no one is worthy of worship other than God. (Ps 115:1, Isa 42:8) It is quite important to keep the title of Mary as Theotokos, especially for its Christological importance, but most importantly to point to the object of worship which she bore, not to herself. The cult of Mary as it arose in Latin Christendom is neither catholic, nor Christian. Mary’s greatness is found in her bearing not a mere man who rose to greatness, but bearing the great God who condescended to humility and suffering.

Truly and simply this is why I cannot be Roman: Romanism too often fails to keep the main thing the main thing. It places a man (or a woman) in the place of satifier, of ultimate authority, and of worship. The center of our life and worship is Christ. Theology is not primarily a reflection on the words of Calvin or Aquinas or papal encyclicals or Ecumenical Councils or Creeds or even Scripture - it is a reflection on the Word. Theology is understood by, points to, resolves in and professes the Word as Person, in Christ. He is our Mediator. His Spirit is our guide. His Father, the Son reveals; for the Triune God is revealed in and by Christ. The Scriptures are His word. The Church is His Bride. Religious reflection can often obsess over Soteriology or Ecclesiology - and this might be acceptable, if it is obsessively looking for Christ. A man who may be too often an idol himself once said: “men are born idol makers.” We may place trust in many things as Christians: a preacher, an upbringing, a teacher, in a Pope, or a Reformer or tradition. Yet none of these is worthy of our trust in the same way as Christ. The highest they can attain to is a pointer to God in Christ.

Why I Cannot be a Roman Catholic (Part 3): I Believe in Merit

The spark of the Reformation is undoubtedly the issue of indulgences. Indulgences, however, only point to the bigger issue of the Reformation, namely: The abandonment by the Roman Church of the catholic doctrine of the work of Christ. But two late medieval innovations must be considered before any evaluation of the Roman Church’s lack of congruence with tradition may be made: penance and merit.

Penance itself was not a new theological concept. The concept would even live on in Reformation traditions. The Eastern Orthodox believed in penance as an instrument of maintaining the seriousness of sin. The late medieval Latin church, however, described the parts and efficacy of penance in a novel way in the time of Duns Scotus. Penance now had three parts: contrition, confession, and satisfaction. One must feel guilt for their sin, confess the sin, and then make restitution for their sin.

The final stage of the Latin doctrine of penance, satisfaction, led to another novel doctrine. Satisfaction had been explored in Anselm before, and as he explained it, satisfaction rests on the basic and reasonable idea that any wrong requires an act of restitution to the wronged party. After Anselm died, later medievals began applying satisfaction to the work of penance: man was able by his own actions to merit grace from God. The best short summary of this belief was stated by theologian Gabriel Biel: “When people do their best (Quid in se est), God infallibly gives grace.” This was because, “by virtue of contrition our sins are forgiven.” [John Fisher]

The problem with this formulation of satisfaction in penance and merit lies in its novelty.

The gospel the early church found in Scripture did not look for the salvation of man in men’s own works or man’s merit but Christ. The Athanasian Creed identifies Christ as He “Who suffered for our salvation.” The Niceno-Constantinopolitan creed presents the work of Christ in suffering, dying, and rising again as all, “for us and our salvation.” The Definition of Chalcedon also presents the purpose of Christ’s incarnation as “for us men and for our salvation.” The satisfaction Anselm wrote of in “Why God Became Man,” was the satisfaction of God’s wrath accomplished by God Himself in Christ.

Some late medieval theologians tried to reconcile this contradiction with an explanation of merit as gracious receiving or a distinction between two types of merit (condign and congruent). Man’s merit was merely a lesser merit, in response to grace; a means of acquiring Christ’s “first meriting.” Obviously, Men could not merit all that was needed for salvation. One approach, mostly by the volunteerists, could be seen as a marketplace where a customer might want a product of $100 value, but only possesses $50, or even less, perhaps $10. The merchant graciously sets the condition so that he may give a product worth $100 for the $10 on his voluntary decree beforehand (in actu secundo). [and Protestants are accused of legal fiction!] Others (the more sacramentalist leaning) employed different models, instead putting the customer in need of extra merit so to his own merit would be added what the Church was able to distribute from the “treasury of merits” that Christ and the saints had left over from their good deeds. Men could then merit Christ’s merit. Satisfaction was worked out in an imparted grace in man, where he perfected the grace given him in good works.

Yet, even these were pitiful attempts to harmonize these innovations with tradition and Scripture, because both Scripture and the testimony of the church was to the gospel through the merit of Christ. This is the merit I believe in, Christ's merit won on my behalf. I can do no other from the testimony of Scripture where men’s “wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom 6:23) I can do nothing else from tradition where Augustine, commenting on Romans 6:23 wrote, “[Paul] preferred to say ‘the gift of God is eternal life,’ in order that we might understand that God leads us to eternal life for His mercy’s sake, not for the sake of our merits.”

The formulation of penance made by some late medievals violates the catholic faith. Athanasius in On the Incarnation stated: “But [mere] repentance would, firstly, fail to guard the just claim of God.”[sec 7]

No act of repentance or penance by itself can answer God’s demand for justice in man's violation of His infinitely great law. Athanasius argues man was the offender, but man was incapable of atoning for his own sins. God was the only party that had the ability, but was not man in order to make atonement. Thus, God must become man to be our substitute:

“It belonged to none other to bring man back from the corruption which had begun, than the Word of God [Jesus].” [sec 10] “The common savior of all has died on our behalf, we, the faithful in Christ, no longer die the death as before.” [sec 21]

True merit is found only in the passion of Christ, not in the works wrought by people. The true strange work of salvation is not accomplished in reconciling God to man inside man, but “alien” to man (Isaiah 28:21) Righteousness is not found coming from man, but “the Lord is our righteousness” (Jer 23:6)

There could hardly be stronger words in Scripture for the uselessness of our deeds before God. We have nothing of value to exchange, indeed what we have is of anti-value. Our reading of Isaiah 64:6 is sanitized in our translations because we do not want to offend people at church. But when our righteousness is called “filthy rags” the translation is inaccurate. The proper meaning of the words translated “filthy rags” is actually “soiled menstrual rags.” There are few ways to more emphatically stress the anti-value of works than calling them bloody tampons. They have no value and are negative in value. If you try to sell them, people may pay you to get the menstrual rags away from them, but not give them a positive value higher than their already positive value. Any talk of our relative merit is mere sophistry. As Paul tells us:

For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the Scripture say? "Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness." Now to the one who works, his wages are not counted as a gift but as his due. And to the one who does not work but believes in him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted as righteousness. (Rom 4:2-4)

That is why Paul said, God is the “one--who will justify the circumcised by faith and the uncircumcised through faith.” The gospel tells us “It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.” (Rom 4:24-25)

The work of Christ is the ground of justification, not works or merit. Christ is the satisfaction and propitiation of God’s wrath, not our dirty menstrual rags, for as much as we think our filth is worthy, God does not want to touch them, and cannot be near our most holy deeds for they are all tainted with the stench of sin. As Clement of Rome so aptly put it, we “are not justified by…works which we have wrought in holiness of heart.” The catholic faith is in the God who justifies the ungodly, who Himself must merit our salvation if we are to have any hope of salvation. I hope all who read will realize that there is no other refuge except when “your faith and hope are in God.” (1 Pet 1:21)

The catholicity of the Reformation

The more I read about the Reformation, the more I am interested in what I would call the second-generation Reformed ecumenism. The Reformed and Lutheran camps were at odds in the first generation between Zwingli and Luther, but second generation reformers John Calvin, Phillip Melancthon, Thomas Cranmer, Martin Bucer and Bullinger all made moves towards uniting the Reformed, Lutheran and Anglican streams in one Reformation confession. Often the starting point was the Augsburg Confession, especially as explained by Melancthon. Tragically, the more ardent Lutherans rejected Melancthon's efforts as compromise and liberalism, the Church of England went from the golden age of Protestantism under Edward VI to the brutal rule of Catholic Bloody Mary in which Cranmer was burned at the stake, and so reconciliation was thwarted, despite its Biblical mandate.

I recently encountered an interesting article online I thought I would recommend. It is not a published article, but most of the article consists of cited quotations of documents and correspondence. It highlights the efforts of John Calvin towards unity, but this was not at the expense of purity, as the author concludes:

"For Calvin the fundamental criterion for unity was pure doctrine."

1054: The Great Schism and the Reformation

I've been making my way through the works of Jaroslav Pelikan on the History of Doctrine, in his series, "The Christian Tradition." Volume 2 is all about Eastern Christendom and it's independent development in doctrine. I really knew nothing about some of the issues Eastern Christians dealt with in regards to the debate over Christ's will (did He have one or two) and icons. A selection stood out to me as I have been asking this question while reading the book: Would the Reformation have happened if Rome had not made a power grab in insisting on Papal Supremecy? Pelikan gave this answer (actually quoting heavily from Zernov):

"The Schism between Eastern and Western Christians is one of the greatest calamities in the history of the Church. On the one hand, it seriously underminded the Christian East to the advance of Islam, and on the other hand, it hastened the centralization of Western Christendom, which resulted in many abuses and provoked widspread discontent, so that the Reformation itself, which split the West into two hostile camps, was one of its consequences." (Christian Tradition Vol 2, pg 147)

Low cost grace! [or why I'm glad I'm Protestant]

Get it while it lasts! The Roman Catholic Church, for a limited time, is offering grace in the form of Indulgences again! It's Easy: You do a work and you get grace! Not scriptural you say? Hmm, how to explain this, how about I put as: Make yourself to differ from others and boast in your merit! Still Not scriptural? How about buying and selling in the temple? Oh, that's worse. How about paying for what you get for free...

Good and Bad Baptists

I wrote in a previous post that a Restorationist/Baptist reading of Church history is wrong. I wanted to clarify that a bit in this informational post. In re-reading that old post, I did not want to paint all Baptists with the same brush. I see two historiographies used by Baptists (and to some measure all Protestants) and only one of them can claim to be orthodox. The first is what I would call Restorationist. You may have heard of "The Trail of Blood." Consult the illustration below.
The graph attempts to claim a lineage with a collection of heretical groups (such as Montanists) who were persecuted and claims they were the true church stretching back to Christ himself. The church is seen, then, dying and resurrecting every few years with a very few number in the true church, but most lead astray by Catholics and Protestants (These Restorationists would reject the label Protestant.)

The second historiography claims common lineage with other Protestants, and, before 1517, the pre-Council of Trent Catholic Church. These Baptists tend to be Reformed Baptists, claiming a heritage in Zwingli's Reformation in Zurich, and thus claiming to be "Reformed totally", rather than keeping infant baptism and a few other Reformed distinctives.
All this to say, a historiography that claims commonality with the Reformed movement and other orthodox Christians through the centuries should be the accepted orthodox view. To claim otherwise is dangerous as

1) It disbelieves Christ's claim to be with the church in all ages. (Matt 28:20)

2) It associates with heretical groups that may even be anti-Christian (i.e. not orthodox on the Trinity, diety of Christ and more important issues than if they dunked infants)

3) It separates from other true Christians in a claim on orthodoxy that is based on a particular doctrine of baptism, rather than on the person and work of Christ, something I think is important. Not that other doctrines are not important, but they are not the grounds for orthodoxy and common cause in the gospel.

That's just my two cents.

McGrath's Dangerous Idea?

Alister McGrath's new book "Christianity's Dangerous Idea" on the Reformation has been getting some positive buzz lately (here and here). After listening to a recent interview with McGrath (mp3) McGrath repeats something I first heard him say on a documentary on Luther. McGrath summarizes the "Dangerous Idea" as this: The Reformation was about the right of every individual to interpret the Bible for themselves. Now McGrath is 1000 times smarter than me and has been a Luther scholar for longer than I have been alive, but that summary bothers me. Wouldn't that make Luther the father of Liberalism that says "it is all about what it means to you, rather than an objective meaning."

Paul Althaus, a Lutheran scholar, said: “Luther never understands the priesthood of all believers merely in the sense of the Christian's freedom to stand in a direct relationship to God without a human mediator. Rather he constantly emphasizes the Christian's evangelical authority to come before God on behalf of the brethren and also of the world. The universal priesthood expresses not religious individualism but its exact opposite, the reality of the congregation as a community.”

Has anyone read the book yet? Am I getting the wrong conclusion from McGrath? Or is he right about Luther's individualism?

[I've loved McGrath's contributions to a theology of science and spirituality, where evangelicals are lacking, which is why he is distressing me here!]

Hymn: For All the Saints (for November 1 - All Saints Day)

November 1 is All Saints Day. While we celebrate the accomplishments of the Reformers on Reformation Day, it is also good, the next day, to celebrate our oneness with all Christianity. C.S. Lewis said he did not go for praying to saints, but he did like the idea of being aware that we pray with the saints. Thus, I love this hymn. This hymn gives us our center. This hymn is about what made, and makes the saints great: Christ.

1. For all the saints,
who from their labors rest,
Who Thee by faith
before the world confessed,
Thy Name, O Jesus,
be forever blessed.
Alleluia, Allelu...

2. Thou wast their rock,
their fortress and their might;
Thou, Lord, their captain
in the well fought fight;
Thou, in the darkness
drear, their one true Light.
Alleluia, Allelu...

3. O may Thy soldiers,
faithful, true and bold,
Fight as the saints
who nobly fought of old,
And win with them
the victor's crown of gold.
Alleluia, Allelu...

4. The golden evening
brightens in the west;
Soon, soon to faithful
warriors comes their rest;
Sweet is the calm
of paradise the blessed.
Alleluia, Allelu...

5. But lo! There breaks
a yet more glorious day;
The saints triumphant
rise in bright array;
The King of glory
passes on his way,
Alleluia, Allelu...

6. From earth's wide bounds,
from ocean's farthest coast,
Through gates of pearl
streams in the countless host,
Singing to Father,
Son, and Holy Ghost,
Alleluia, Alleluia!

(An album with a great version of this song.)

I WILL celebrate Reformation Day!

[update: I do read and appreciate the Internet Monk on various issues, but I will echo John Adams critique of Thomas Paine in regards to the monk: He knows better what he is tearing down than what he wishes to build up.

And yes it does have a snarky tone, for that I apologize]

At another blog, the "internet monk," a Southern Baptist who is somewhat self-loathing of his tradition (Baptist) and his branch of Christianity (Protestantism) wrote a rather whiny post about how the Reformation wasn't all that great. I wanted to comment on a few of these whines:

(Internet monk in BOLD and me in ITALIC)

-I do not believe true Christianity was restored or rediscovered in the Reformation.

me neither. But when the questions were asked about "how am I saved?" the Catholic Church got it wrong. God saves us, not works or actions. God. The question had not been asked in quite the way Luther asked it in regards to Indulgences. Christianity T-ed at that moment in time, and so Reformed Christianity is about development from that point, not going back to some mythical time when everything was better like the 400s, the Nicene Council or the Acts church. So, fine. Have your realization that the Baptist/Restorationist reading of Church History is wrong. That doesn't make the Reformed/Lutheran/Anglican reading wrong...

-I’m convinced that it didn’t take long for Protestantism to accumulate enough problems of its own to justify another reformation or two.

Don't know what he means here as he thinks the first one wasn't all that necessary, but once it got going THEN we need to get back to somewhere...

-I now believe that "tradition" is a very good word.

Good for you. me too

-I believe we ought to grieve the division of Christianity and the continuing division of Protestantism.

Jaslov Pelikan (Lutheran theologian) called the Reformation a tragic necessity. So it will always be. Yet, the continuing division is not one sided. A mend could have happened if not for the negative reactionism of the Council of Trent.

-I can see huge omissions from the work of the reformers, such as a theology of cross-cultural missions and much more.

They didn't develop the Baptist theology of the alter call either, so did they not believe in responding to the gospel? Calvin was sending missionaries into France, who were dying by the dozen. Sorry he didn't develop missional theology but merely practiced missional obedience.

-I no longer believe Luther ever intended to slay the Catholic Church and establish the wonder of contemporary Protestantism.

sure he didn't. Are you new to the history of the Reformation? He wanted to reform the church, not kill it. Yet, we remember the corrupt Roman bureacracy did not want to reform, but continue to sell salvation and tax the poor and live like kings.

But here are some things I firmly believe about the Reformation:

There may never have been a Reformation if not for the doctrine of papal supremacy.

If the Catholic Church was less reactionary and corrupt, the church may never have split.

Catholicity is based on Christ, not on bureaucratic succession.

The Catholic Bureaucracy of the sixteenth century was not exibiting the signs of the true church: the gospel, ministry to the poor, right administration of the sacraments or the ministry of the word.

The Reformation was a tragic necessity, one where we mourn its necessity, not its theology.

So go ahead and mourn the Reformation, yet the mourning should be for the circumstances that necessitated it just as we mourn the death of Christ, not because of what it accomplished (that we celebrate) but because our sin demanded it.