Albany Via Media

October 5, 2010

To the Editor:

On rereading Marya Dodd's earlier letter, I see that she did not actually say that we must “leave our brains at the door to say the Creeds.” I conflated her comment about church membership with her friend's statement: “If I had to believe everything in the Nicene Creed I'd be out of here.” Fair enough — it is important not to misrepresent those with whom we are in conversation, especially when we often disagree.

I actually agree with Marya that there is and ought to be “room” in the church for people with varying understandings of the Creed (however erroneous they may be), and I also agree that “all of us must struggle to find our place in the faith” and that “this develops over our lives and is a deeply personal journey.” I have people in my congregation who range from conservative evangelicals to what you might call “High Church Unitarians” — all are invited into fellowship with the Father through their participation in Jesus Christ by Word and Sacrament. People respond to that invitation in different ways at different times, but they are welcome to be there as they are.

We gather around the altar as sinners seeking forgiveness, and as learners who have not necessarily put it all together — seeking instruction from the living Word with the guidance of the Holy Spirit. While it is hard to see how one could be called a Christian without confessing Jesus as Lord and Savior, “correct theology” on every point is not a condition for membership, nor a prerequisite for the Grace of God (else it wouldn't be grace).

On the other hand, theology does matter because truth matters. There is objective content to the Gospel, and it is possible to grasp that content with understanding and faith, just as it is possible to misconstrue or distort that content. Hence I would place a higher standard on those in holy orders, precisely because it is they who are authorized and commissioned to teach the faith.

Marya's letter prompts the following two comments:

1. Does she really think that there is anyone in the Episcopal Church or the Diocese of Albany who expects people to “leave their brains at the door” to become members of the church? Surely not. That sounds like a straw man to me. (Though personally, I wish people would use their brains a bit more than they do. The Gospel really is worth thinking about.)
2. I have no problem with metaphor; any textual tradition must come to terms with metaphor (“bread of life,” “lamb of God,” “Good Shepherd,” “light of the World,” “Temple of the Holy Spirit” … etc.)

But I don't think the articles of Creed have the character that we ascribe to metaphor.

Is the Resurrection of Jesus a myth or a metaphor — or is it an actual event? The Crucifixion? How shall we understand “very God from very God”? The Nicene fathers did not intend this claim to be taken as a symbol for something else -- they meant it at face value: Jesus is divine just as the Father is divine. And they would not allow any fudging on this point.

The virgin birth grates against a modern materialist sensibility, but it was intended literally. Those who have trouble with it may resort to seeing it as a symbolic statement of Jesus' divinity — but that is not the intended meaning of the text. Similarly, the return of Christ to judge the living and the dead may be hard for us to wrap our minds around, but the function of the creed is to challenge us to grapple with this remarkable hope and expectation.

You do have to wrestle with these claims in order to believe them, and not just parrot what someone else wants to you say. I certainly would not want to run someone out of the church who was wrestling with one or another of these points and had not arrived at a fully orthodox understanding. But I wouldn't make them a bishop!

Christopher Brown+