Et Erravit Ecclesia
8 July 2008 - 6 תמוז 5768 by Huw
ICUT erravit Ecclesia Hierosolymitana, Alexandrina, et Antiochena: ita et erravit Ecclesia Romana, non solum quoad agenda et caeremoniarum ritus, verum in his etiam quae credenda sunt.
As the Church of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch have erred: so also the Church of Rome hath erred, not only in their living and manner of ceremonies, but also in matters of faith.
I do agree with the Serge on this. At heart, this quote from Article XIX of the XXXIX Articles of Religion is the centrepiece of Protestantism.
It is one of two things:
It could be the nihilistic assurance that there is no authority that is safe, and the enforcement of non-tradition and Sola Ego of modernism and postmodernism. Clearly this one line can be seen, in a post-modern and solipsistic way, as that self-conflicted line “there is no absolute truth.” Once you point out that churches can err, it becomes necessary for only this one line to be true. All other lines - including the rest of the Articles of Religion - may prove to be false. It is up to (fill in the blank) to figure out what is true and what is not.
I can see how it can be seen as that.
On the other hand, this article could be the divine and blessed assurance that churches will err, but God is working it all out; that matters of creed and doctrine are urgent: but not salvific.
Some Christians make much of institutions, claiming there is no salvation outside the church - which is mostly visible within the four walls of their denomination (or a small circle of select denominations).
This article frees the human from that enslavement without condemning us to nihilism.
The Church needn’t be perfect - says this - for there to be salvation which comes from God’s hand: and it worked out in each life, in the community of the Church, yes (no one is saved alone) but we think if it the wrong way, if we’re not careful. We are tempted to think, “here I stand in the Church to work out my salvation” when, in fact, it might be better to say, “here I stand to work out my salvation, here is church.”
If one thinks the Church is to be about having “a correct list of doctrine”, the 39 Articles say clearly, right up front, “eh, we may be wrong.”
One can imagine that this means, “Therefore there is no church.”
What it means is “Church is something else besides doctrine.”
At that is a good and joyful thing to say to the Saints of God.
Hmmm,
You keep insisting that no “Church” really has the right to set doctrine. I don’t meant set doctrine as a disciplinary internal matter, but set doctrine as a dogmatic matter. But, that reminds me somewhat of those who used to claim that Christianity is a psychological crutch. The obvious counter-claim is that it is Atheism that is a psychological crutch. Methinks you protest too much on this issue of the Church setting doctrine.
I didn’t say there wasn’t Doctrine (qua Dogma): I said some might be in error. What I did say was the the Protestant reformers said no church was error-free and that some take that to mean “there is no church” which claim I reject.
Imperfection is not a denial of church: as long as the church has in it humans being saved, there will be imperfections. If there were something perfect, infallible, etc, there wouldn’t be any humans in it, at all.
That’s a very curious reading of the 39 Articles of Religion. Reading through the whole document, it was obviously written in the spirit of “they’re wrong, we’re right, thank God we came along to recover the truth and set things right, so listen up, everybody.” It a very doctrinal (and doctrinaire) document, setting doctrine, against which you see to inveigh, as to what is necessary for salvation (i.e., “salvific”).
Interesting reading of the 39 Articles. I think that, back when they were written, they were intended to be a somewhat more moderate document that would allow a type of Catholic/Protestant church to grow in England. I will say that they were clearly anti-Roman, but not necessarily anti-Catholic.