So, after my recent discussions with my Catholic colleage, which had been leading me towards Rome, I have been having a new set of discussions with another colleage, who is Polish. She is currently in a Baptist Church, but while in Poland was in a 'Pentecostal' church.
The history of this church [my synopsis of what she said] is that it started as a charismatic group within the Catholic church. They started to study the Bible. Finding discrepancies (so far unspecified) between RC practice and the Bible, the group started to do what they understood the Bible to be saying.
The RC Bishop gave the group an ultimatum, that they should either return to the church's practices, or leave. So they left. They continued to exist as an independant charismatic group with a RC heritage but with Scripture as their plumb line.
At this time a Pentecostal (Elim I think) missionary came and started up a church in the town, but the Charismatic catholic group and the Pentecostal church soon realsised they were basically the same, and merged.
So, this moves me away from Catholisism. Confused as ever.
JPII was a great supporter of the charismatic movement in his Church. However, part of the point of being a Catholic Christian is not insisting that the "untutored ploughboy" stands on the same level of the Church's scholars, teachers, and pastors as interpreters of Scripture.
ReplyDeleteThey weren't guilty of embracing the gifts of the Spirit - indeed if that were the issue they would be commended. However, they were guilty of heresy (that the Church is not the authoritative interpreter of Scripture) and schism (leading people away from the one Church).
Thanks for your comments Kyle. It’s always gratifying to know people actually read this stuff! What I write below is stuff you will already have heard and formed strong opinions about, but I put it as a response for other readers. I usually get the wrong end of the stick in your comments anyway!
ReplyDeleteThe ‘untutored ploughboy’ may not know the Scriptures as much as the scholars and teachers, but he may have an equal or greater measure of the true interpreter – the Holy Spirit (not that He can be measured out in that way). Jeremiah chapter 31 applies:
33 "This is the covenant I will make with the house of Israel
after that time," declares the LORD.
"I will put my law in their minds
and write it on their hearts.
I will be their God,
and they will be my people.
34 No longer will a man teach his neighbor,
or a man his brother, saying, 'Know the LORD,'
because they will all know me,
from the least of them to the greatest," [my emphasis]
declares the LORD.
"For I will forgive their wickedness
and will remember their sins no more."
There are plenty of erudite scholars, pastors and teachers whose knowledge is academic and their faith very shallow. It is the right of the congregation to challenge the teaching they are given. Even the Apostles were not exempt from this scrutiny as we know from the Bereans in Acts 17:10. So that is the model: hear a message, check the Scriptures.
It is OK to have Apostolic Succession, and assume that today’s teachers derive their authority from the Apostles. But then today’s teachers must submit to the same level of scrutiny as the Apostles did.
I enjoyed Scott Hahn’s “Rome Sweet Home”, in which he recounts his journey from being an anti-catholic Presbyterian to a Roman Catholic apologist. Scott seeks to find a scriptural basis for Roman Catholic doctrines, and much of what he says is very good and I have adopted it into my own theology. But also much of it requires too much convoluted logic and wild assumptions for me to swallow. On the question of the authority of the church to interpret scripture his best effort seems to be 1 Tim 3:15 – the church is the pillar and foundation of the truth. Scott mistakes ‘pillar and foundation’ for ‘source and interpreter’. The verse actually talks about a pillar and foundation in the context of Greek sculptures which were set on top of a pillar and a foundation. The pillar and the foundation exist to display the statue, to uphold it, but do not contribute to the forming of it. The pillar and foundation are below the sculpture, and are there to be overlooked in the greater glory of the sculpture itself. The church should display the truth – as suggested by the context of the passage which is all about godly living, not exegesis. And you can see the sculpture without climbing the pillar.
So, if you have two groups of people, one full of the Holy Spirit and following scripture albeit with errors in their interpretation, and one following the Chinese whispers of tradition and the echoing emptiness of academia, guess who I would rather be with? Guess which one I think has moved away form God’s intentions for the church? [NB there are also some brilliant spirit-filled scholars]
And if you hold to the idea that the church is the authority, then really we should all become Roman Catholics again – it’s not a sustainable position outside of that church.
And even if it were, does that mean if you happen to be an American Episcopalian you would have to go along with TECs approach to gay marriage? Are not CANA and AMiA Schisms?
Oh, I don't argue that the successor of Peter really does have the gift and authority to infallibly interpret the Bible. Rather, I'm arguing that your anecdote is completely consistent in a Roman Catholic outlook.
ReplyDeleteBut how do you know that these people really have the Holy Spirit (wait, I thought the whole point was that the Spirit couldn't be owned?), and that Scripture really is their "plumb line." I reject the notion that even Rome holds teaching that is just full of errors that could be fixed by a "plain reading of scripture." And this little charismatic group that you would trust so implicitly sounds like a group that refuses the tutelage of any "brilliant spirit-filled scholars."
My whole point is that this group shouldn't be part of the Catholic Church anyway - they should leave and take their chances, because they are Protestants in the purest sense: every man a Pope.
And Anglicans do insist that "councils doth err," as do all men. However, the question of Tradition is not one of zeros and ones, not a yes or no proposition. If the Romans introduce a new doctrine (such as the immaculate conception of Mary) and claim apostolic succession of their token of the Spirit's sponsorship, and your charismatic scalawags claim that God wants to prosper them and insist that their "sign gifts" serve the same purpose, how do you give either of them the moral high ground?
(On a related note, I find it odd that in another post, you called those who ask for our Lady's intercession, "idolators," but most Pentecostals I've ever heard of are comfortable praying to demons, and address them far more often than my Roman friends address their departed friends in Christ.)
Hi Kyle
ReplyDeleteI agree that while for the sake of arguement I kept things simple and black and white between the two groups, grey reality is rarely so simple and God keeps loving people that i really think He shouldn't :-).
If - i mean when - charismatics start to pay more attention to their 'sign gifts' than scripture, they invariably go astray. I heard of a case of a man who claimed the spirit had told him to marry the church secretary, notwithstanding that he was already married. A quick check of scripture would expose this as folly.
i am not being partisan, I am saying scripture is the narrow way, and if you fall off it makes little difference whether you fall to the right or the left.
But I would point out that neither you nor I have any evidence to suggest that any kind of fringe stuff - which is rejected by most pentecostals I know - is occuring in this particular Polish group. My colleague affirms they follow scripture - I have to endorse the principle.
I don't thnk it is appropriate for you to call them scalawags - but maybe the word is less offensive in America than here.
It is mistaken to say Pentecostals 'pray' to demons. 'Prayer' implies supplication. Exhorcism is command, not supplication. Pentecostals are following the example of Paul, who adressed the spirit in the girl in Acts 16:18 commanding it to come out. There is no equivalent example that I am aware of in the 66 books of communicating to departed Christians (including Mary). So I don't accept your analogy. One is scriptural (though overused, abused and misunderstood in many cases), the other is not scriptural as far a I can tell.