Entries from July 2008 ↓

Frequent commenter on this blog, Internetmonk, a.k.a. Michael Spencer, has a fascinating discussion of what sounds like a growing phenomenon: Post-evangelicalism. He defines it this way:

Post-evangelicalism is a way of relating to the present seriously compromised, perhaps terminal, condition of evangelicalism by accessing the resources of the broader, deeper, more ancient Christian traditions that contemporary evangelicalism, in its pragmatic idolatry, has largely abandoned as sources and influences.

Some of the post-evangelicals are flirting with Rome. And some of them seem to be involved with the misguided experimentation of the “emerging church” (someone correct me if I’m wrong). But they are trying to rediscover historical Christianity, usually including liturgy and sacraments.

I’m glad to see that this quest often includes drawing from Lutheranism. As key thinkers in this movement, Internetmonk/Spencer cites the recently-deceased Robert Webber (call him a high-church evangelical, a professor at Wheaton who received his doctorate at Concordia Seminary), and, from the Reformed camp, Michael Horton (sometimes accused of being a crypto-Lutheran). Internetmonk/Spencer himself says how Luther has helped him in his own theology.

As a Lutheran, so much of what other Christians are yearning for and rediscovering I already have. (Though, ironically, many in our church are wanting to imitate evangelicals at the very time evangelicals are trying to find a way to be post-evangelical, a quest that would be fulfilled in confessional Lutheranism, which, let it not be forgotten, was the first movement to go by the accurate name “evangelical.”) Sadly, many post-evangelicals come to a local Lutheran church that they find, to their dismay, is just like the megachurch they are trying to go beyond.

But let me just say to the post-evangelicals that you do not have to choose, as some of you seem to be doing, between the Gospel and Liturgy, between the Bible and the Sacraments. Properly understood, those two are not dichotomies but go together. One can have the best of Protestantism and the best of Catholicism (without the worst of each). Lutheranism proves that. (If you don’t believe me, read my book The Spirituality of the Cross: The Way of the First Evangelicals.

Thanks to Rev. Joel Brondos, a leading practitioner of Classical Lutheran education, for his comment on the post “Classical Education vs. Traditional Education.” In case you missed it:

Not only is “classical education” not to be equated with “traditional education.” It isn’t a repristination of the “classical” education from previous centuries either. There are, in fact, various kinds of classical education(s).

Among the people I serve, “Classical Lutheran Education” teaches children to look to God in faith (justification) and to care for one’s neighbor in love (vocation) following the Six Chief Parts and the Seven Liberal Arts.

It holds that “freedom” (i.e. liberal) isn’t merely formed from the crucible of ancient democracies but is fashioned rather in terms of Luther’s work “The Freedom of a Christian,” the paradox wherein a Christian “is the most free lord of all, and subject to none; and is the most dutiful servant of all, and subject to all.”

We not only teach children to read well; we teach them to be well-read. We believe that teaching content is just as important as teaching skills and that teachers must not merely be masters of methods but shall have mastered the subject matter.

We teach what it means to be human, selecting literature not merely on the basis of whether it has a controlled vocabulary or has been a cultural favorite but rather in terms of what it teaches us about the human condition.

And when it comes to teaching science and mathematics, we also teach about the lives of scientists and mathematicians, so that children know that math is not merely cold calculations but the awesome discoveries of geniuses.

We don’t try to entertain children or excite them, but rather we strive to fascinate them, directing their curiosity by means of disciplines so that their future creativity draws on the wonders they have observed and learned with a keen eye.

We teach Phil. 4:8, “Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things” even as we teach children not to be “tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes” (Eph. 4:14).

Which reminds me, if you want to learn more and to put this kind of education into practice, whether at home or a school, come to the Consortium for Classical Lutheran Education conference next week, August 5-7, at my new stomping grounds, Patrick Henry College, Purcellville, Virginia.

Rev. Larry Beane, a.k.a. Father Hollywood, has a profound and most encouraging post,
The Church: Rent and Distressed. He makes the point that, despite our search for the perfect and unified church, one mark of a true church is Satan’s opposition, and thus to the church’s constant assaults with heresies and schisms that the Devil keeps stirring up within the body.

Luther considered the “cross” - that is persecution, to be a “mark of the Church.” If Satan is not working night and day to destoy you, you have become uninteresting to him. Only one who is hopelessly lost has that kind of “luxury.” As long as the Bride of Christ endures in the fallen world (and our Lord promises that not even the gates of hell will prevail against her) the true Church will suffer the assaults of schism and heresy bubbling up from within.

This reality is of great comfort when we see encroachments of the secular world upon the Church. For if she were not the Church, Satan wouldn’t care to attack her.

No part, jurisdiction, denomination, or confession within the Church Catholic is exempt from such internal discord - though some feel the need to put forth the illusion that their particular denomination is free from such schisms and heresies.

Father Hollywood goes on to show in detail that the Devil really has a thing against Anglicans, also Lutherans, Roman Catholics, the Reformed, and even the seemingly homogenous Eastern Orthodox (among other traditions one could add). This means that each of these communions poses a particular threat to the Enemy and embodies in a particular way Christ’s church.

I would think, though, that Satan sometimes wins, with some church bodies ceasing to oppose what he puts forward, so that what was once of value in these traditions ceases. But I take his point, that the search for a perfect strife-free church–to the point of dividing into ever-smaller sects, then to a group of your closest friends meeting at home, then to just meeting with your family, then to being a church consisting of your own sweet self–is to pursue a theology of glory rather than a theology of the cross.

HT: William Weedon

Thanks for the discussion on “house churches.” I agree that congregations can meet in homes but still be orthodox, have pastors, and be connected to a larger institution. Indeed, that may be a good way to go. However, I believe most house churches today are distinctly anti-institutional. This came up in the previous discussion, but what do you think of “home churches”?

This is an outgrowth of the home school movement in which individual families meet together on Sundays and have their own worship service, with the father serving as “pastor.” No one else is present except the family members.

Does THAT constitute a valid congregation, or does it violate the command in Hebrews not to forsake gathering together?

Victor Davis Hanson dissects Barack Obama’s speech in Germany. Hanson’s point is that the “world” doesn’t take actions; nations do. And that nations are not morally equivalent. Excerpts:

With all due respect, I also don’t believe the world did anything to save Berlin, just as it did nothing to save the Rwandans or the Iraqis under Saddam — or will do anything for those of Darfur; it was only the U.S. Air Force that risked war to feed the helpless of Berlin as it saved the Muslims of the Balkans. And I don’t think we have much to do in America with creating a world in which “famine spreads and terrible storms devastate our lands.” Bad, often evil, autocratic governments abroad cause hunger, often despite rich natural landscapes; and nature, in tragic fashion, not “the carbon we send into atmosphere,” causes “terrible storms,” just as it has and will for millennia.

Perhaps conflict-resolution theory posits there are no villains, only misunderstandings; but I think military history suggests that culpability exists — and is not merely hopelessly relative or just in the eye of the beholder. So despite Obama’s soaring moral rhetoric, I am troubled by his historical revisionism that, “The two superpowers that faced each other across the wall of this city came too close too often to destroying all we have built and all that we love.”

I would beg to differ again, and suggest instead that a mass-murdering Soviet tyranny came close to destroying the European continent (as it had, in fact, wiped out millions of its own people) and much beyond as well — and was checked only by an often lone and caricatured U.S. superpower and its nuclear deterrence. When the Soviet Union collapsed, there was no danger to the world from American nuclear weapons “destroying all we have built” — while the inverse would not have been true, had nuclear and totalitarian communism prevailed. We sleep too lightly tonight not because democratic Israel has obtained nuclear weapons, but because a frightening Iran just might.

HT: CRB

A manifestation of the view that community, not doctrine, should be the basis for choosing a church is the phenomenon of the house church. A small group of friends get together in each other’s houses on Sundays for worship and Bible study. There is no clergy and no institution at all, really. It is the polar opposite of the megachurch.

George Barna has said this is the wave of the future, and I know some people who “do church” in this way. Members of house churches claim that this is the model of the early church. What do you think about this? Could a house church constitute a valid congregation? Or is it intrinsically sectarian?

An important distinction noted at the CIRCE conference, from Andrew Kern: Classical education is NOT the same as the traditional education of the 19th century one-room school house. Here is an overview of the history of American Education:

Colonial era-1810. Classical Christian Education.

1810-1890. Traditional Education. Or, more technically, “secular democratic education.” Retained the classical emphasis on content and a broad curriculum, but, in reaction against “European” elements, moved away from classical subjects. The classical emphasis on “community” was replaced by an emphasis on “society” (see the difference?). Theologically, love of neighbor was replaced by love of country. Education became compulsory, shifting the authority in educational matters from the parents to the state. Secular democratic education was also utopian (”Protestantism without faith”), Hegelian (history seen as a progression culminating in today), and Prussian (drawing on that militaristic state’s innovations in regulation).

1910-today. Conventional Progressive Education.

Many people on all sides of the education debates today confuse classical education with traditional education. Some are saying that to get back to classical education, we may need to go through traditional education first. But the two seem so different, especially since the classical goal was to form free citizens, as opposed to controlled citizens.

More from the CIRCE conference, from a talk by think-tank veteran Barbara Elliott:

From 1901-1987, various governments took 207,500,000 lives.

The number of people killed by their own governments was approximately 169,000,000.

The Soviet Union killed 62,000,000. (Stalin alone: 42,000,000)

Communist China: 35,000,000.

Nazi Germany: 21,000,000

Something else I learned at the CIRCE conference: In the heyday of Soviet Communism, the penalty for possessing a Bible was 3 years in prison. Think of that the next time you dare to read that dangerous book.

I’ve been at the CIRCE conference in Houston, which offered not only tips for classical education but, what is supremely classical, actual content. I learned some things that I’ll be posting on this blog.

For example, we had several presentations that drew on Russell Kirk, arguably the father of modern conservatism. One of his points was that the root of “culture” is “cult”; that is, the foundation of every culture is a religion with its distinct way of worship. (In cultures that reject religion, an ideology takes its place, as happened with Communism.)

That’s a profound point in itself, but then it made me wonder: I have always complained about Christians who conform to today’s culture with all its woes. But could it be that the problems in the church came first, creating our cultural woes? Did the secular liberalism of the European state churches produce the secular liberalism of modern Europe? Did the subjectivism of Christianity (which certainly began in the 19th century) produce the subjectivism of contemporary culture?

If so, reforming culture would simply be a matter of the church getting its act together.

Baylor University went through another president, this time firing John Lilley. He had only been at the Baptist university for three years. The previous president, Robert Sloan, was also forced out, but for different reasons.

As I understand it, Dr. Sloan pushed through a plan called Baylor 2012, in which the school would become BOTH a major research institution AND a distinctly Christian university. That is a brilliant goal, much-needed in both the church and the academy. We desperately need a conservative Protestant version of Notre Dame, with a grad school that can turn out Christian scholars and professors of the highest quality.

Dr. Sloan made good progress on that front, assembling some first-rate Christian faculty members. But the old guard faculty resented them and would not abide any whiff of creationism or intelligent design. Dr. Sloan was forced out, whereupon many of these young Christian professors were purged in tenure fights.

Dr. Lilley, now, has been ousted by the board of regents, seemingly for the opposite reason, of not taking the Baylor 2012 plan seriously enough, especially when it comes to integrating faith and learning.

We should all hope and pray that the next president puts Baylor back on its Christian course, while also being able to handle the faculty who will oppose that.

(If I’ve got the conflict wrong, Baylor fans, please correct me.)

Some 200,000 Germans came out to hailBarack Obama . Does that make you like him more–after all, he would surely make America more popular around the world–or does it make you like him less, with global politicking and his talk of “global citizenship” giving you the creeps?