The Second Vatican Council teaches us Catholics that we must accept Protestants as brothers in Christ, and give them much respect indeed (which was implicit in St. Augustine's view regarding Donatists, and in St. Thomas Aquinas also). Even the "notorious" anathemas of Trent do not
apply to whole groups so much as to individuals. There is much more leeway in those statements than is usually understood by those who object to them so vociferously. But it is a convenient "whipping-boy" so it is always used as an example of so-called Catholic "intolerance," hubris, and (the bad sense of) "dogmatism."
It's easy to "intercommune" when groups believe less and less. Hence all the "United" mainline denominations. The more they gave up historic denominational distinctives, the more they could "get together." Luther damned Zwingli over the Eucharist. Now fewer and fewer Protestants even care about what it means. Why bother with trifles? People like the Presbyterians and Methodists were willing even to change from the biblical wine (i.e., Last Supper) in their communion services to grape juice simply because of the political leverage of the temperance folks in their midst. If you don't even follow the biblical example of the elements in communion, why worry about the metaphysical transformation? but I hasten to add that not all Protestants approach the matter with such a breezy casual attitude. It's a trend. One can always find many exceptions.
I follow Louis Bouyer, Karl Adam, Cardinal Ratzinger, Pope John Paul II and the mainstream Catholic opinion that the Protestant Reformation had many positive elements mixed in with what we consider to be heretical error, and that it was in part a judgment on the Catholic Church for corruptions in practice and neglect of ancient truths. Bouyer points out that, e.g., elements in late medieval nominalist soteriology were distinctly semi-Pelagian. Luther's view was not(though it was extreme in its double predestinarianism). In that way, Luther was correct. What he (and many Catholics at the time) neglected to see was that traditional Catholic soteriology was as entirely based on God's free grace as Luther's was.
I think we can get along and treat each other as brothers and sisters in Christ, however the denominational differences are regarded and applied in such things as communion and membership criteria. I never became a member of the Assemblies of God (where I attended for four years) because I disagreed with their notion of the "enduement of power," whereby all who were truly filled with the Spirit would speak in tongues. So I didn't become a member, but that doesn't mean I looked down my nose at those who did believe this. It was simply an honest disagreement. Nor did I dispute the perfect right of the Assemblies of God to have this belief and make it part of their "16 Fundamental Truths." I didn't buy it, myself, because I didn't see it in the Bible.
But now the tendency in evangelical Protestantism is to split into two broad camps of either "fundamentalist/exclusivist" or "tolerant advocates of diversity on the 'secondary' issues." I was always in the second camp as a Protestant, and maintain the same general ecumenical attitude as a Catholic, but I was never willing to claim that there were whole areas of belief which could never be finally determined, as disturbingly many Protestants do today. I always believed that there was one truth, even if I had to compile it from a hodge-podge of existing denominational traditions, none of which got it all right. In the end I came to believe that there was a Church which got it all right under one roof, and that only because of God's gracious guidance and protection by His Holy Spirit.
A doctrine (such as baptism) is trivialized if it is concluded in despair that no determination of which doctrinal understanding of it is true, can be made. I see that as a concession to "Enlightenment" and post-modernist relativism. If a person thinks there is one truth about baptism but doesn't yet personally know what it is, that is one thing. If a person thinks there is one truth and that Christians shouldn't anathematize each other over it, that is another. But if a person says that the perspicuity of Scriptures (or, if you will, Church history) definitely cannot positively decide the issue, so that it must remain a debating-point till Kingdom Come, then I think an internal coherence problem (both with sola Scriptura and with philosophical/theological relativism) is revealed.
When I was a Protestant I always had a mixture of views, based on what I felt was the closest to biblical truth. I had a Baptist view of (what other Christians called) the sacraments: symbolic Eucharist; symbolic adult baptism. I had a Reformed outlook on Christ and culture, apologetics (for the most part, along the semi-evidentialist lines of Sproul and Schaeffer), and eschatology (I converted away from pre-trib rapture, pre-mil views as an evangelical) and civil disobedience. I had a Presbyterian, semi-congregational view of ecclesiology, and a Wesleyan, Arminian view of soteriology. My view of Church history was more-or-less (but not quite) akin to a traditional Anglican approach (I never forsook sola Scriptura as a Protestant, but I highly respected Christian Tradition). My moral theology was increasingly Catholic as the years went on. I opposed divorce, abortion, female ordination, premarital sex, etc., and eventually, contraception, in the half-year before my conversion. I was fond of the monastic tradition and Catholic spirituality. I was (and am) a charismatic with regard to the spiritual gifts. I had a very low-church, "Jesus Freak" disdain for formal liturgy. I always despised religious liberalism and fundamentalist legalism and anti-intellectualism alike. Etc., etc. Was there one denomination that combined all these elements? I never found one within Protestantism (and I don't think it exists to be found).
The Bible is clear that doctrinal and personal division is sinful, and an abomination (and that charity is required towards all). I think we can agree on that much, and not be led to the despairing position that because division is always with us (like the poor), therefore it is normative and some sort of message to us. That is as silly as saying that because sin is always with us, it, too, is "normal" and right. Catholics are idealists in that regard, unlike Protestants, who necessarily (because of the very nature of individualistic Protestantism) must accept their sinful divisions and schisms as an ongoing reality (inevitably brought about by their formal principles, whether they desire this or not). But Catholic ecclesiological idealism (called "triumphalism" and "intolerance" by detractors and critics) is based in faith in God's omnipotent power to preserve One Church and One Apostolic Deposit, not on man's alleged ability to "figure out" on an individual level, what the one truth is, scattered over hundreds of competing Christian groups which are (by any report and reasonable description) hopelessly contradictory.
Let's do a thought-experiment. Since Catholics are obligated to believe in papal infallibility (it being a dogma and therefore non-negotiable), for me to allow the papacy to be negotiable would be to yield up orthodox Catholicism; therefore I would have to either be a liberal Catholic (who picks and chooses doctrines to adhere to at whim) or no Catholic at all (or, well, . . . an Anglican). In other words, to do this would mean to cease being Catholic as an orthodox Catholic understands the word and the belief-system. Yet this is what is needed for "genuinely constructive dialogue" (as many Protestants who desire ecumenical progress maintain)? This is in effect, the demand: "unless you cease to be [orthodox] Catholic, we can't engage in dialogue that is 'genuinely constructive' with regard to ecclesiological controversies which divide Christians." That in turn boils down to: "your position is so immediately untenable and implausible that to even hold it at all proves in and of itself that you lack the capacity for
constructive dialogue."
Therefore I submit that the dogmatism which hinders good discussion is not entirely confined within Catholic environs. The true ecumenical spirit
acknowledges honest differences held by intelligent, committed, sincere folks on all sides, and proceeds from existing differences to look for
commonalities. The ecumenist doesn't demand right off the bat that someone must give up their heartfelt beliefs to even obtain a seat at the table
of "open-minded discourse." So it appears to me that many Protestants who reason in this fashion end up committing the very dogmatism that they
purport to be so against.
Catholics don't say that there is no legitimate Christian community without a bishop, but rather, that there is no apostolic succession. That is hardly a notable or controversial claim since those who don't believe in apostolic succession in the first place care little about whether I as a Catholic assert about that attribute. To my mind, the important consideration (in an ecumenical context) is whether another group is considered Christian and in possession of grace. Catholics readily grant that to all validly-baptized trinitarians. But everyone knows who goes around denying that other types of Christians are in fact Christians. Once again, then, the "triumphalism" or lack of "centrist" attitude is much more characteristic of several brands of anti-Catholic Protestantism than of Catholicism. People in glass houses . . .
Why is it considered such an amazing, extraordinary, implausible, intolerantly "dogmatic and triumphalistic" thing for a Catholic to simply believe that the Universal Church should have a leader, just as any boy scout troop does, or corporation, or mountaineering expedition? I wonder why this particular discussion has to be that way, and what it is about non-Catholic premises and viewpoints in this regard that causes proponents to have such an ideological -- almost guttural -- hostility to the papacy: the very concept of it, even before we get into how the office has been exercised, used, or abused, throughout history?
Why would Protestant views be regarded by anyone as inherently superior and more plausible than Catholic ones? How is it, e.g., that they can appeal to some nebulous, ethereal "tradition" which leads them to believe that ecclesiological diversity, or evolution according to the times, is a more acceptable solution to the issue at hand than some form of papacy (either the Catholic version, or the "Anglican/Orthodox" version)?
Which concept is more plausible a priori: Protestant subjective opinion as to what constitutes a "proper" or "agreeable" ecclesiology, based on what they think is comfortable and reasonable, but not on Scripture, and not in any readily identifiable tradition, or the Catholic view that Jesus
appointed a leader to His Church, which was to be a perpetual office, protected by the Holy Spirit with the gift of infallibility, based on many indications in Scripture, and observed throughout the history of Christianity?
We believe the pope is infallible and protected from error when he declares on a doctrine, to be binding on the entire Church. But he always does this in consultation with the bishops, priests, and the faithful. It is a consensus agreement in reality. This was true, e.g., with regard to the
proclamations of the Bodily Assumption of Mary in 1950 and the Immaculate Conception in 1854. The declaration on papal infallibility itself was not made by a pope but by an Ecumenical Council.
I don't think the papacy is a whit less plausible than the notion of sinful men being inspired to write infallible and inerrent and indeed, divinely-inspired Scripture, by the power of God. What fascinates me, however, is what many Protestant apologists come up with as an alternate
proposal. In effect, and in a very real, concrete sense, they make themselves the arbiters of true and false doctrine in a way which far, FAR succeeds any prerogative that any pope has ever exercised. For they assume from the outset that they have some alleged prerogative (deriving
from who knows where?) to sit and judge ecclesiastical systems, and grade them on a scale, apart from biblical standards which would form some objective criterion by which to reasonably judge such options.
So the Protestant of this sort concludes that a variable, diverse model is the thing we should go for. It is thought that the very idea of a pope implies or inevitably amounts to "lording it over" the flock. Of course, that does not necessarily follow. If authority is proper and necessary, its
exercise might, and often unfortunately does, but does not have to necessarily involve raw power or power politics, or pride, etc. We don't say that the President of the United States is "lording it over" everyone, when he makes a decree or signs a bill. We acknowledge all sorts of legitimate "top-down" authority, from the Supreme Court, to mayors in their cities, to coaches of sports teams, or air traffic controllers who have the final say. Why is it considered such a novelty for the Catholic to have a similar view on Christian governance -- one which he can back up with the Bible, history, and reason?
Many non-Catholics who are engaging in ecumenical endeavors are confusing the roles of dogma and ecumenism, and neglecting beliefs held in faith. They act as if the ecumenical enterprise is one where all parties come to the table and start with the premise: "you have some truth; we
have some truth; let's bargain and wheel and deal (like politicians working on some pragmatic compromise on legislation) and see what sort of compromise we can achieve, so that a new Christian truth and resolution can come about."
In fact, this view isn't about achieving new Hegelian-type syntheses or truths, so much as it presupposes (usually only half-consciously at best) the relativism and indifferentism that characterizes liberal theology and secular philosophy. This is what the Catholic objects to from the outset, because everyone's deepest-held faith-convictions should not be subjected to such pragmatic, arbitrary conditions. That's not how genuine ecumenism works. Catholics believe there is one truth and one apostolic deposit. Most Protestants used to believe the same thing, till theological liberalism brought in this notion of relativism and "tolerated diversity."
All parties agreed that the Bible taught one truth; they disagreed on what that one truth was. But Catholics are often expected to adopt Protestant presuppositions of diversity or relativist or evolving models of ecclesiology to talk at all; to "do" ecumenism. Nothing less than that is
satisfactory, and exhibits an outrageous hubris, as if simply having a view that one believes is true (and therefore excludes others which contradict it), is an inherently objectionable state of affairs. This is not "centrism;" it (i.e., this particular attitude, not the entire belief-system of the one stating it) is pure philosophical and theological liberalism. No one of any view (Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican, Anabaptist) would have spoken like this until very recently in history. All parties would have advocated one position as true, leading to inevitable opposition to contrary views.
Dogma is not the equivalent of intolerance and pride that "we are RIGHT and everyone else is a deluded simpleton, fool, or idiot and dead-wrong, period." Dogma is belief that certain things are true and others false, based on religious faith and any number of justifications from reason,
experience, the Bible, history, etc. Dogmas and doctrines are not up for grabs as soon as we sit down and try to be "ecumenical." Such a view would violate the very importance and centrality of the doctrines of Christianity we are all ostensibly fighting to uphold.
No; ecumenism is the endeavor to find as much as we have in common, to rejoice in those things, and to build upon them. It isn't about giving up truths here and there, as if Christian doctrines were like poker chips, which we can throw into the pot, to see how it comes out, or like vegetables to throw into the stew, which emerges as another entity after it is cooked. We start with our own views and talk to our brothers and sisters in Christ with respect, and attempt to learn about their viewpoints, and the rationales they offer for them.
The Anabaptists, for example (to illustrate precisely the opposite approach to Christian differences), come on the scene in the 16th century and started advocating adult baptism, with no particular historical precedent. They simply assumed they were right, and "biblical," and proceeded onwards. Everyone else was wrong. Sacred Tradition counted for little or nothing. What Christians had believed for 1500 years was entirely irrelevant. Luther broke down the notion of an authoritative, binding Christian Tradition in 1521 at the Diet of Worms ("Here I stand," etc.), and soon other Protestants started applying it against his own views (particularly on the Eucharist and baptism), with all parties mutually anathematizing and appealing to the "perspicuous" Scriptures. Hence, one of the leading Anabaptists, Melchior Hoffman (c.1500-c.1543), pontificated in 1530, in "super-papal" tones:
And now in this final age the true apostolic emissaries of the Lord Jesus Christ [the Anabaptists, of course] will gather the elect flock and call it through the gospel and lead the Bride of the Lord into the spiritual wilderness, betroth, and covenant her through baptism to the Lord . . .Hoffman thus cavalierly relegates to hell and "anti-Christian, satanic" status, all Catholics, Orthodox, Lutherans, Anglicans, Methodists, Presbyterians, and anyone else holding to infant baptism. Of course, Hoffman appeals to "clear" Scripture in all this, too. In his treatment of the
. . . only that should be taught by our apostles which the Lord has commanded them . . . thus many countless souls will not be done to death by these blind leaders, who so
brazenly, without any fear, spit in the face of God Almighty, crucify the Son of God, and then tread upon him with their feet. O how heavily will such a one be visited by God with stern wrath and be tormented and made to pay with the eternal unending zeal of the Fire of the Almighty!
Accordingly, all human notions are sternly forbidden by the Lord, and pedobaptism is absolutely not from God but rather is practiced, out of willfulness, by anti-Christians and the satanic crowd, in opposition to God and all his commandment, will, and desire. Verily, it is an eternal abomination to him. Woe, woe to all such blind leaders who willfully publish lies for the truth . . . willfully to mock and desecrate the Prize of God the Highest! . . . they will inherit the eternal wrath of God. For God is the enemy of all liars, and none of these inherits or has part in his Kingdom. Their inheritance and portion is rather eternal damnation.
Eucharist, he adopts the heretofore-unknown purely symbolic view, and opines:
Such a simple explanation stolid fisherfolk could well understand even when they were still in the first birth, but one over which the wise and greatest scholars of Scripture for their part have become fools and madmen, and still are . . . I think that this is a great horror that those learned in Scripture should thus reject such simple reasons . . . The shrewd and the wise for their part have become fools and daily more so. They write big and thick books, and they always teach but themselves never come to the knowledge of the truth.In one fell swoop, then, Hoffman manages to be anti-institutional, anti-historical, anti-sacramental, and anti-intellectual. No mean feat! This, I think, perfectly illustrates my point. If we reject some form of apostolic tradition or succession, we are left with the arbitrary interpretations of self-anointed Super-Popes like Hoffman or Luther or Calvin or Henry VIII, or individuals' judgment. I see no reason why that ought to be the standard of judgment, over against a historically-based Tradition, passed down and developed from the time of the Apostles, through the Fathers, the Schoolmen, and later medieval expositors, down to our own time, defended from Scripture and reason, and held in faith. At least the latter notion is a corporate one, and based on some sort of consensus, not the whims and fancies of a despotic megalomaniac like Hoffman, who thinks nothing of damning everyone to hell (Catholics and fellow Protestants alike) who disagrees with him on baptism or the Eucharist.
(From: The Ordinance of God, in Spiritual and Anabaptist Writers, edited by George Hunston Williams, Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1957, 188, 193, 195-196)
All Christians have dogmas, which are not arrived at lightly, and therefore not given up so easily. Dogma is a good Christian concept. All Christians have "non-negotiables" at some point. Papal infallibility is one of these for Catholics. That doesn't make us automatically inflexible, dogmatic (in the pejorative sense), and so forth. Protestants have many of these, too. The only difference is the specific content: which doctrines are distinctives on either side.
To "respect" someone's views does not require an espousal of them. One can have respect for a view that is conscientiously thought-out and held with a heartfelt, sincere belief, without agreeing with it. One can always be theoretically convinced by another view. This happened to me when I converted.
I'm not fighting against open-mindedness and the willingness to be convinced otherwise, should that eventuality occur. I always assume that from the outset. Rather, what I am objecting to is the notion that we in effect have to adopt a form of relativism or indifferentism in order to do
ecumenism at all. Ecumenism acknowledges existing differences. That in itself is a gesture of respect. It is the demand that the other person give up some belief as immediately outrageous and unbelievable which is the intolerance view, not mere acceptance of dogmas on either side.
There is more to ecumenism than trying to persuade the other guy and/or reach new doctrinal syntheses (if indeed that is what it is about at all -- I would contend that that is the primary goal only of liberal ersatz "ecumenism"). Oftentimes, people also find out that they are much closer in viewpoint on this or that after they talk through things fully (I would say that is even true of the vexed issue of the filioque).
I would like to cite prominent evangelical (and Calvinist) Anglican J.I. Packer, writing in the ecumenical book, Evangelicals and Catholics: Towards a Common Mission, edited by Charles Colson and Richard John Neuhaus (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1995 pp. 148-149, 161-167, 171-173). His perspective shows that it is not at all contradictory to be quite "inflexible" and uncompromising in belief (to believe one's own teachings wholeheartedly) and to be committed to ecumenical efforts at greater understanding and cooperation:
Some of my correspondents have wondered whether my attitude to Roman Catholics and the Roman Catholic Church has changed over the years. I wish, therefore, to state explicitly that so far as I am aware everything I have ever put in print on this subject still stands . . . I myself write as the Protestant evangelical that by conviction I am . . .
ECT [Evangelicals and Catholics Together -- the well-known ecumenical statement which Packer signed] applied what was once the 'Lund principle' . . . that ecclesiastically divided Christians should not try to do separately what their consciences allow them to do together . . . Agreement is first announced on the Apostles' Creed, on the proposition that 'we are justified by grace through faith because of Christ,' and on the membership of all believers in the family of God. A commitment then follows to seek more love, less misrepresentation of each other, and more clarity about continuing doctrinal differences . . . and joint action for the conversion and
nurture of those currently outside the faith. Grass-roots 'cobelligerence,' to use the late Francis Schaeffer's term. is ECT's theme. It identifies common enemies (unbelief, sin, cultural apostasy) and pleads that the Christian counterattack on these things be cooperative up to the limit of what divergent convictions allow . . .
At this point I must state explicitly that I am not and could not become a Roman Catholic because of certain basic tenets to which the Roman system, as such, is committed. First, Rome's claim to be the only institution that can without qualification be called the Church of Christ . . . Bowing to Peter among the apostles as having definitive personal and pastoral authority over all the congregagtions, in the way that Roman Catholicism today makes acceptance of the papacy a defining mark of Catholic identity, is not however part of the New Testament picture . . . Again, the developed Roman Catholic teaching on the Mass and on merit . . . cuts across Paul's doctrine of present justification . . . And all modes of the Marian cult, of the invoking of other saints, and of the belief in purgatory, and all reliance on the disbursing of indulgences . . . have the effect of cutting across, choking up, and damping down the full joyful assurance of present and future salvation . . .
Finally, the infallibility claimed for all defined church teaching and the insistence that the faithful take their beliefs from the Church as such rather than the Bible as such make self-correction as ordinarily understood virtually impossible within Roman Catholicism. The assumption that on basics the Church is never wrong is very cramping . . .
Despite the shortcomings of Rome's official teaching, there are many Roman Catholic Christians . . . I, for one, thank God for the wisdom, maturity of mind and conscience, backbone and sheer guts, reverence before God, and above all love for my Lord Jesus Christ, that I have seen many times in Catholics . . .
Cooperation with the Roman Catholic Church is not what ECT is about. The path of joint action that ECT envisages is not churchly but parachurchly . . . ECT is tentatively feeling its way towards a pattern of this kind that would involve Roman Catholics and would seek to do so on a principled basis, without compromise on either side . . . Neither evangelicals nor Roman Catholics can stipulate that things they believe, which the other side does not believe, be made foundational to partnership at this point; so ECT lets go Protestant precision on the doctrine of justification and the correlation between conversion and the new birth, just as it lets go the Roman Catholic dogmas of baptismal regeneration and the sacramental structure of the doctrine of grace . . .
Today, . . . the deepest and most hurtful division is between theological conservatives . . . who honor the Christ of the Bible and the historic Christian creeds and confessions, and theological liberals and radicals who for whatever reason do not; and this division splits the older Protestant bodies and the Roman Catholic communion equally, from the inside . . . Well does ECT say, 'The differences and disagreements . . . must be addressed more full and candidly in order to strengthen between us a relation of trust in obedience to truth.' Without this ECT will get nowhere, nor will it deserve to.
Baptist Charles Colson wrote in the same book (pp. 34-36):
The ecumenical movement among liberal Protestants sought to unite various denominations by eliminating doctrinal distinctions. For those who no longer believe in the Bible or any kind of supernatural revelation, such doctrinal compromises come easily. But the deepening alliance between groups of evangelicals and Catholics that is occurring today is wholly different, because it is a cooperation among Christians who take doctrines very seriously indeed . . .
One must emphasize that [C.S.] Lewis's 'mere Christianity' was no watered-down ecumenical formula designed to promote Church unity by diminishing the importance of crucial doctrines . . . Just so, the document Evangelicals and Catholics Together was drafted by believing Catholics and believing Protestants, people at the center of their communions, who realize that they have more in common with one another than with the borderline liberals of their own traditions . . . This new cooperation requires neither evangelical nor Catholic to compromise their respective doctrinal convictions . . . What we emphasize is that evangelicals and Catholics affirm many of
the same truths.
This is my brand or model of ecumenism. It is the furthest thing imaginable from "feigned respect" for other views. It assumes them, in a real world stance, not a pipe dream one, and goes from there to see what Christians have in common, and how we can live and work together in mutual respect. It requires neither a giving up nor compromising of distinctive views before the "talks" can even begin.
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