Late Night Haiku X
XXVI.
Hope erodes at times
To the loneliness of truth,
But it does not die.
XXVII.
Autumn leaves pass by,
Season grows shorter briskly now,
Oh! To slow the end.
XXVIII.
A stream bubbles, faint,
As my thoughts like water flow,
Will they come ashore?
Seems Accurate Enough
| You Are Likely an Only Child |
 At your darkest moments, you feel frustrated.At work and school, you do best when you're organizing. When you love someone, you tend to worry about them. In friendship, you are emotional and sympathetic. Your ideal careers are: radio announcer, finance, teaching, ministry, and management. You will leave your mark on the world with organizational leadership, maybe as the author of self-help books. |
Is the Reformation Over?
Mark asked me about Mark Noll's Is the Reformation Over? in my last post. I respect Noll quite a bit, so I figured I'd probably agree with him, but I am not familiar with that book, so I decided to look around a bit about it. I found a speech from last year in which Noll summarized the book.
I think Noll seems to be right that Evangelicals (in the broad sense that includes those of us who are Reformed) and Catholics have more in common than we have in differences. Primarily, he isolates the views of the Church (do believers come before the church or the church before believers) and tradition. I'd tend to agree. Most other differences (such as views of the nature of Holy Communion/the Eucharist, the authority of the papacy, and the importance of Mary) draw out of the realm of tradition. For instance, as the Orthodox Church did, pre-schism, I think many Protestants will gladly give the Pope a great deal of respect, but we won't elevate him to a position of the final authority of the Church. That is a view supported by Catholic Church dogma, not Scripture — at least in my view as a Protestant — and thus so long as I look with suspicion on tradition in and of itself, I obviously will not support that view of Pope (even though I really respect the pontiff).
These differences are significant, but not a barrier. As Noll says,The “mere Christians” in all of these traditions believe very similar things about the inspiration and authority of the Scriptures, the Trinity, the centrality of the work of Christ for human salvation, and the power of the Holy Spirit as the motive force for holy living in the world. But each tradition expresses these realities with characteristically different emphases:I personally am attracted to the mystical character of Orthodoxy, the grandeur of the Catholic Church and the emphasis of the priesthood of the individual believer in Protestantism (I won't reject Pentecostalism, but have a harder time picking out anything I am particularly appreciative of in that case). That is to say, I do not look down on the other two great wings of the church for their distinctives; in fact, as a Protestant, I envy them for those things that we lack. I think this is key to the question of if the Reformation is over: I think it is. I think the lessons of the Reformation are still valid and that is we should always reform and be on the lookout for unscriptural dogmas, but that does not necessitate continued isolation between Protestants and Catholics. As Noll says,
Orthodoxy, the mystical mysterious of God
Catholicism, the power of God to build his City
Protestantism, the civil society shaped by individual choice
Pentecostalism, the direct empowerment of the Holy Spirit
We have gathered here today as people who not so very long ago looked upon each other as orcs and elfs, and were as repelled by orc-speech and elf-speech as it was possible to be. Today, it is more like ents and hobbits, not yet speaking the same language, but nonetheless getting quite a charge from hearing the other tongue and actually getting along quite well together. Might God do even more? Look around you. Listen. It is happening right before your eyes and ears.Amen.
The 488th Reformation Day
My professor of religion and advisor is a wise man. Today, when he saw me, he smiled and wished me a “Happy Reformation Day!” He is one of the few I know who make it a habit to wish a happy Reformation Day, but I think that's a good habit. To an extent, Reformation Day is like Good Friday — it is a day that isn't exactly happy, but on the other hand, it is a very happy day indeed. Let me explain.
It is a dreary day for the obvious reason. As with the Great Schism of 1054, Reformation Day marked a day in which the unity of the Church was irreconcilably lessened. But, that is only one aspect of Reformation Day. The good Dr. Martin Luther never intended to split the church, only to fix what was wrong with it (click the link to read the 95 Theses and A Mighty Fortress is Our God, as I posted them two years ago). In the long run, that much was a success: even the parts of the church that did not split off were forced to begin to clean out the corruption of the Renaissance age. Would we have the Vatican II era in the Catholic Church without the Reformation? It is something to consider.
That is what we should take away from Reformation Day today. This is a day of renewal, not destruction. While it has taken almost 500 years, these days the parts of the one universal Church are communicating better than they have since October 31, 1517 (well actually better than they have since the beginnings of the Great Schism in the ninth century or so). In what might have seemed very odd not that long ago, and what is still perhaps ironic, I spent part of today working on a web site for a Catholic ministry. What this day should remind us — regardless of whether you adhere to the Protestant, Orthodox or Catholic creeds — is that we should always seek truth, for as the saying I still cannot find the citation for says, between God and truth there can be no conflict. The church here on earth will always be collecting barnacles that prevent smooth sailing, and it is good to look and clean those off every so often.
A day that leads to self-reflection is a good day. So long as we do not look at Reformation Day as something from the past, but as something very real in the present, it is a good day that helps us continually aim for the goal: Soli Deo Gloria.
Happy Reformation Day to all of you.
The Road Ahead
I've been trying to figure out where I am headed, in a number of ways, for some time. In different ways, I've tried to make some strides in two particular cases over the past week. I'll deal with one way now, and one in a future post, I hope.
For the past four or five years, I've realized my calling is in academia. I'm a theologian at heart and in the present time, academia would appear to be the best place to go to work on such a pursuit. Instead of the more practical pastoral ministry, this is a ministry, but one for the mind more than the heart. That is to say, my “patron saint” would be Thomas Aquinas and not Francis of Assi; John Calvin rather than John Wesley; C.S. Lewis rather than Rick Warren. The need for both is strong; these are a complementary pursuits. Knowledge does not save, but it does provide a stable foundation for faith — it is the well tilled soil in which carefully planted seeds can thrive.
I am aware that I am squarely aiming myself for a field that is “highly competitive,” which means I must be as well qualified as possible if I hope to actually crack the nut and get in. With that in mind, I'm considering exactly what kind of training I need to take aim for. Some have advised me to make my next goal a MA in Religious Studies, presumably continuing to a Ph.D. in the same. This would be useful, but is rather limited: should I ever wish to do anything in the other realms of ministry, I'd be totally unqualified by many standards (be they legitimate or not). Moreover, while I readily admit and appreciate the usefulness of anthropology, sociology and other disciplines which inform the Religious Studies field, they are not the part of the Critical Study of Religion that I have the biggest affinity with. I'd rather focus on Christian theology and philosophy and supplement that so as to make myself able to teach World Religions and other similar courses.
It seems to make the most sense to take aim for some kind of seminary degree. Ultimately, I am mostly convinced to aim for a Ph.D. track (be it directly from a school that would start me off working in that direction immediately or working through a masters and then finding a place to continue later), but along the way I must decide whether to go with a MA in Theology or a M.Div. For my purposes, the former is mostly what I need, and would allow me to reduce the amount of time I have left to reach my goal in about six to seven years rather than seven to eight. But, again, it leaves something lacking in ordination qualifications, which I think might be a mistake. Therefore, I am mostly leaning toward an M.Div. Although I do not see myself in a pulpit ministry, I do want to pursue ordination eventually.
That is not the end of the discussion, of course. My big decision is whether I should aim for the local PCA seminary, which is small and I've been looking at for some time (Covenant), or perhaps I should instead aim for a PC (USA) seminary back East. Some of those who advise me seem to think (I suspect correctly) that the well established PC (USA) seminaries may be more oriented to the scholarly, rather than practical, and therefore better suited for an academic career. This, of course, could be crucial to actually making it into a good position down the road.
Right now, the two seminaries I'm looking most closely at are Covenant and Princeton, but I'm still doing a fairly cursory consideration. Some others that I'm planning to examine more closely are Fuller and Union. I've briefly considered Concordia, which is also in town, but I think I've ruled that out, along with Trinity. The main criteria that will end up deciding what happens are class sizes, academic job placement success rates and scholarliness. Cheaper would be nice too, but none of them are going to be cheap. I would like to stay here in St. Louis, or nearby, but I don't want to shoot myself in the foot either. I'm most likely aiming to stay within the Reformed tradition as opposed to the more Evangelical seminaries.
Any recommendations, would, of course, be appreciated.
Reformation Sunday
Well, I wrote up a really nice post on Reformation Day and, particularly, reflections on some of the problems it leaves us with today, but I'm afraid I hit the wrong button and it went off into the abyss. It was probably the best post I've written in awhile, but not good enough to warrant rewriting the whole thing, so I guess I'll leave well enough alone for now.
Something, That's What.
In response to my last post — it has been a bit of a peculiar week, but overall, everything went better than I had hoped. I am thankful for that. I almost feel as if the last week hasn't really occurred, but I don't mean that in a bad way.
I have a few blog entries I'd like to write if only I had enough time to do so. It just seems I never have time and energy at the same time lately. Oh well.
What Have I Done?
I'm still wondering about that. I sent out a letter that I wonder if I should have sent. More once I see how things settle down.
The MacIntyre Adventure
For my philosophy independent study, Modern Ethical Theory, we are using exclusively primary sources. I always enjoy sticking to primary sources, so I'm pretty happy about that. I will say, however, that my present read, After Virtue by Alasdair MacIntyre, is really slow going. It isn't that it is hard to understand, nor that it is uninteresting. For some inexplicable reason, however, my reading speed just plummets every time I read it. I'm rather glad to be moving on to something else after this week. On the other hand, he does make a lot of good points, and as someone who rather likes Thomistic thought, I appreciate MacIntyre's work to defend the philosophy of Aristotle over Kantian, Utilitarian and general emotive theories. I just wish I could figure out why I move through the text so slowly.
All I Can Say Is...
GO CARDS!!!. Right now, we're behind 3-0. We need to beat the Astros… let's hope it happens soon.
