Earlier in the day the Windsor Continuation Group held a second hearing about what steps to take in light recent provincial incursions, blessings of same sex relationships, and suitable candidates for ordination to the episcopate. Hundreds of bishops attended, and speakers were allowed to address the group’s members, each person receiving up to three minutes; this process lasted well over an hour.
As you might imagine, comments varied not simply widely, but extremely. Perhaps the most disturbing one I heard was that there is only “one interpretation of scripture.” If that were indeed the case, preaching would have ceased over 1900 years ago; the reality is that every generation, indeed, every preacher has been called by God to interpret Holy Scripture in light of the concerns of the day. The most hopeful comment was from someone in the Episcopal Church who is committed to staying in the church in spite of disagreeing over the appropriateness of recent actions, and who wondered why the rest of the Communion couldn’t act similarly.
I ended up being the “clean up hitter,” the last person to speak. My comments were brief. I told the assembled people that my fear is that we are raising issues of church government, finding suitable candidates for ordination, and the pastoral response of the church to its members to the level of creedal authority. Doing so will eventually turn us into a confessing church, not a catholic one, and that is bad for the long term health of the Anglican Communion.
It would be good for the Church if bishops could rise above this level of hyperbolic banality. I would also disagree and argue against the idea that there is “only one interpretation” of scripture (if that was in fact the actual assertion.) But to counter it with an equally vapid response doesn’t help. Perhaps preaching wouldn’t have ceased 1900 years ago, because the goal of preaching is not to preach, but to disciple, and each generation has new disciples. The object of the preaching is not the speaker, but the hearer. Although the hearers change, the key message does not.
I might humbly suggest (not being a bishop, clergy, seminarian, or theologian) that the bishop may have it backwards: Every preacher has been called by God to interpret concerns of the day in light of Holy Scripture. Would that be too disturbing a concept?
This is poppycock. Strong confessional churches like the LCMS have no problem working in many different cultures.
He also says he rejects “one interpretation of Scripture”.
If he really believes this he should stop saying any of the creeds.
Not only is his theology off, but so is his knowledge of sports. The [url=”http://www.webball.com/cms/page3205.cfm?presto_view=C”]clean-up hitter[/url] is the fourth hitter in the batting order – the power hitter who is able to clean the bases with a home run.
Benfield, batting last, was obviously a weak hitter and he whiffed, as is typical for the bottom of the order.
If he wanted to bring himself glory – which is what he seems to be trying to do — he could have claimed to be in the anchor position. Even so, it’s not unheard of to put the slowest person as the anchor so as to give the team a lead and force the slow person to run (or swim) faster.
I enjoyed this as I have many other bishops blogs
The deep problem with this is that when the bishop seeks “a catholic Anglicanexpression of Christianity”part of what that means is that we learn to read the scriptures with the church, both historically and globally. That is exactly what we have not done. We unilaterally
departed from the consensus of understanding scripture on this matter of non-celibate same sex unions in the church east and west and in the anglican communion also. We not only did so but we did so with a process that did an end run around the theological
question and put the practice in place before dealing with the theology.
This is why so many see us as no longer catholic or quickly losing our catholic identity; it is not “one” interpretation of scripture which is sought it is the mind of God made clear to and with the church through scripture.
I am so tired of the non-sequitor that runs “There are many ways to interpret Scripture. So, my interpretation is valid.”
The first statement is true. The second statement does not follow from the first. It is true that there are many valid interpretations of Holy Scripture. But interpretations that make Scripture say what it manifestly does not say or that make is not say what it manifestly does say are not valid interpretations of Holy Scripture.
So, bishop, please stop using this line of argumentation. If you want the Church to approve blessing same sex unions, please show us, in Scripture, where homoerotic relationships are blessed.
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Don’t overlook the catch phrase,
[blockquote]”provincial incursions”[/blockquote]
which is used to shift the blame for orthodox unrest onto outside elements or “agitators” rather than accepting any blame himself.
Rather than “provincial incursions” the departing churches are crying out for and actively seeking relief from the likes of Bishop Benfield.
Does not the bishop set up a false dichotomy? Must a church be either confessing or catholic? Perhaps he laments the need for a “catholic” church to say there are practices and doctrines that are clearly out of bounds. If that amounts to a “confessing” church, then I want that kind of church! And I think it could also be catholic…
Darin+