The Gospel Coalition sides with Trent and rejects the Reformation
Okay, I am exaggerating. Very slightly exaggerating.
The Tweet quoting evangelical scholar Carl Trueman - a quote included in the actual article - stands in stark contradiction to the claims of the magisterial Reformation. In fact, when the quote is placed in its original context, it gets even worse:
Rome has a better claim to historical continuity and institutional unity than any Protestant denomination, let alone the strange hybrid that is evangelicalism; in the light of these facts, therefore, we need good, solid reasons for not being Catholic.
Historical continuity with the Catholic Church is precisely what the magisterial Reformation claimed. In the words of the Augsburg Confession:
our churches dissent in no article of the faith from the Church Catholic, but only omit some abuses which are new, and which have been erroneously accepted by the corruption of the times ... in doctrine and ceremonies nothing has been received on our part against Scripture or the Church Catholic.
Similarly, the Second Helvetic Confession declared:
we retain the Christian, orthodox and catholic faith whole and unimpaired ... We, therefore, call this Church catholic because it is universal, scattered through all parts of the world, and extended unto all times, and is not limited to any times or places ... Nor do we approve of the Roman clergy who have recently passed off only the Roman Church as catholic ... the Church Militant upon the earth has always had many particular churches. Yet all these are to be referred to the unity of the catholic Church.
In terms of institutional unity, both of the above Confessions make clear the significance of the ordained ministry as a divine gift for the right ordering of the Church's life. The Augsburg Confession states "that no one should publicly teach in the Church or administer the Sacraments unless he be regularly called", a view echoed in the Second Helvetic Confession, "no man ought to usurp the honour of the ecclesiastical ministry ... But let the ministers of the Church be called and chosen by lawful and ecclesiastical election".
Historical continuity and institutional unity, then, are key characteristics of the Reformed Catholicism of the magisterial Reformation.
The point of the The Gospel Coalition article was to respond to recent relatively high profile US Protestant conversions to Roman Catholicism. One might have thought that an article seeking to give a deeper and richer Protestant vision would not begin with the Trueman quote - a quote only likely to increase the likelihood of gazes across from the Tiber from those disillusioned by contemporary Protestantism's failures to provide a sense of catholicity reflected in historical continuity and institutional unity.
The article does go on to encourage readers to reflect on historic Protestantism's experience of liturgy, music, and sacraments:
the rich birthright of our “catholic” Christian heritage.
Which is fine - apart, that is, from the scare quotes. Of the 15 uses of Catholic in the article this is the one positive reference, and even then scare quotes are used. Contrast this with the fulsome, regular, confident use of Catholic by representatives and documents of the reformed ecclesia Anglicana.
Cranmer: This is the true Catholick faith, which the Scripture teacheth , and the universal Church of Christ hath ever believed from the beginning - A Defence of the True and Catholick Doctrine of the Body and Blood of Our Saviour Christ, Book III, Chapter I.
Elizabeth I: We and our people - thanks be to God - follow no novel and strange religion, but that very religion which is ordained by Christ, sanctioned by the primitive and Catholic Church and approved by the consistent mind and voice of the most early Fathers.
Jewel: we do show it plainly that God's holy Gospel, the ancient bishops, and the primitive Church do make on our side, and that we have not without just cause left these men, and rather have returned to the Apostles and old Catholic fathers ... we are come as near as we possibly could to the Church of the Apostles and of the old Catholic bishops and fathers - The Apology of the Church of England, Parts II and VI.
Hooker: as the main body of the sea being one, yet within divers precincts hath divers names; so the Catholic Church is in like sort divided into a number of distinct societies, every of which is termed a Church within itself - Of The Laws of Ecclesiastical Polity, III.I.14.
Thomas Rogers: the received public and catholic doctrine of our church ... the apostolical and catholic doctrine of our church - The Faith, Doctrine, and religion, professed, & protected in the Realm of England, and dominions of the same, Preface.
Canons of 1604: Ye shall pray for Christ’s holy Catholick Church; that is, for the whole Congregation of Christian People dispersed throughout the whole World, and especially for the Churches of England, Scotland and Ireland - Canon LV, 'The Form of Prayer to be used by all Preachers before their Sermons'.
Here is the authentic voice of the magisterial Reformation. Any notion that this Protestantism gives "solid reasons for not being Catholic" is the voice not of Cranmer, Jewel, or Hooker but of Trent.
Responding to an earlier round of Protestant conversions to Rome, N.T. Wright - in an interview to be found on, yes, The Gospel Coalition site - lamented:
I am sorry to think that there are people out there whose Protestantism has been so barren that they never found out about sacraments, transformation, community or eschatology.
It is right to contrast the readiness with which Reformed Catholics defended the existence of diverse polities and ceremonies with the belief that universal uniformity in these matters would be desirable. Nevertheless, one should take into account the social context from and into which Carl Trueman speaks. The magisterial Reformers defended national and particular Churches. They would hardly have been enamoured with the plethora of denominations found today in the USA and elsewhere.
ReplyDeleteAs you rightly intimate, in places with a strong catholic/orthodox national church other than the Roman Catholic church, as e.g. 17th century England or 21st century Russia, the question "why are you not Roman Catholic?" does not have the strength Trueman attributes to it. But the situation is arguably different in places without a functioning catholic/orthodox national church.
Thomas, many thanks for your comment. It is a good point about the context from and into which Trueman speaks. That said, and with all the qualifications necessary regarding denominational pluralism, I do not think it aids Protestant theology to accept a RC critique that Protestantism cannot give an experience of historical continuity and institutional unity. Even amidst a variety of denominations, mainstream Protestantism (at its best) can do this, not only within particular traditions, but also increasingly between traditions (inter-communion, mutual recognition of ministries etc).
DeleteMy concern was not so much with the question "why are you not RC?" as with Trueman's - admittedly uncharacteristic - use of "Catholic" to mean RC. If we are seeking to assure those looking across the Tiber that a richer experience of theology, liturgy, church, and ministry can be found on this side of the Tiber, I do not think we can do so if we abandon - as Trueman did in this quote - the use of 'Catholic'.
Brian.
I fully agree. Protestantism can give an experience of historical continuity and institutional unity. And abandoning the term "Catholic" is the fundamental problem in Trueman's piece.
DeleteMany thanks, by the way, for this and other blog posts. It is perhaps in the nature of things that disagreement more readily occasions a comment, because it may further discussion and learning, than simple appreciation.
Thomas, I entirely agree about the nature of comments and how they further discussion and learning. I certainly find it much more useful to be pushed and challenged, so thank you (and apologies if my response suggested otherwise).
DeleteBrian.