Well, most of it....
Christmas 2006
God give you joy as you celebrate the birth of Christ this Christmas!
The most significant even of this year for our family has been the safe arrival of our baby daughter, Emmanuelle Magdalen. After some initial difficulty, I have mastered the spelling of her name, and I’m enjoying the bird-like human being that she is becoming. We haven’t yet settled on a shortening for her name. I’m considering calling her by the first 2 digits of her medicare number.
Believe it or not, Francesca will be starting school next year (she turns 5 this February!). If they are offering a subject on ‘The Care and Grooming of Toy Ponies’ she will be a star student. Francesca is very much like a pony, as it happens. In fact it’s tempting to go and buy her a float, so that we can transport her properly for long trips.
I’m glad to say that Cesca is a budding Shakespeare enthusiast. She recently sat down and watched the whole of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’. It could be that she is actually a fairy enthusiast. Or, in the end, just a TV enthusiast.
One more thing with Cesca: every time I look at her buck-toothed smile I know that one day I will be helping to pay for an Orthodontist’s BMW.
Oscar has had a great year at school, with an excellent teacher. He must use up loads of energy at school, because, although he eats so much cereal that he was recently approached by Kellog’s to head up their Australian operation , he is a skinny fellow. Really, you could play xylophone on his ribs. Oscar recently played Joseph in the church’s Christmas presentation, and insofar as all he had to do was act asleep (for Joseph’s dream), he was a natural. If the Christmas story included Joseph playing Demolition Derby on PS2, then Oscar could handle that part of the role with aplomb as well.
You won’t be surprised to hear that Meg has been spending most of her time caring for the kids. She’s a fantastic mum, and the kids love her.
I’ve had a good year here in Bendigo. If you want to see pictures of what’s happening in our lives, as well as read my various rants and conspiracy theories, then look up my blog: http://epistolaeobscurorumvirorum.blogspot.com/
I’m looking forward to the celebrations and festivities of Christmas. May God bless you with a relaxing and refreshing break, and with the peace Christ Jesus freely gives!
Fraser, Margaret, Oscar, Francesca, and baby Emmanuelle
Thursday, December 21, 2006
Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Tagged by Schutz
I notice that I've been tagged by David Schutz on his blog 'Sentire cum Ecclesia'. The theme is 'five things you may not know about me'. I think being tagged means that I'm meant to do a blog on the tag theme. Well, here goes...
1. I consider Shane Warne to be a genius. On the field.
2. I met my wife (proleptically speaking) at St Mark's in Sydney when I was in year 12 and she was in year 7; but I thought she was a university student.
3. In my first year of university I got four passes. The perfect first year of Arts.
4. I was in a band with the current Anglican Priest at St Bart's, Norwood.
5. I eat Carman's muesli most days of the week. My sister in law introduced me to it. It's great stuff.
Is that OK?
If Alex Pietsch is reading this, I'll tag him.
1. I consider Shane Warne to be a genius. On the field.
2. I met my wife (proleptically speaking) at St Mark's in Sydney when I was in year 12 and she was in year 7; but I thought she was a university student.
3. In my first year of university I got four passes. The perfect first year of Arts.
4. I was in a band with the current Anglican Priest at St Bart's, Norwood.
5. I eat Carman's muesli most days of the week. My sister in law introduced me to it. It's great stuff.
Is that OK?
If Alex Pietsch is reading this, I'll tag him.
Thursday, December 07, 2006
Sanctified Vision and Praying the Bible
There has recently been written (2005) a very good short introduction (139 pages) to Patristic exegesis called 'Sanctified Vision: An Introduction to Early Christian Interpretation of the Bible' by John J O'Keefe and R R Reno (The Johns Hopkins University Press). I bought it because I had read it praised very highly by ELCA theologian David Yeago. It is one of the most refreshing books on the church fathers that I have read.
One quote: "However opaquely, Ignatius expresses the single most defining feature of patristic exegesis: the presumption that knowing the identity of Jesus Christ is the basis for right reading of the sacred writings of the people of Israel" (p28).
Up at Synod a couple of months back Adam Cooper and I, in our spare time, read through sections of Mariano Magrassi’s ‘Praying the Bible: An Introduction to Lectio Divina’ (The Liturgical Press, 1998 – also short – 126 pages). This book is a gem. It is a sophisticated, scholarly, and amazingly clear and simple introduction into the monastic tradition of reading the Scriptures.
One quote (which is a quote of Smaragdus): “Reading enables us to learn what we do not know, meditation enables us to retain what we have learned, and prayer enables us to live what we have retained. Reading Sacred Scripture confers on us two gifts: it makes the soul’s understanding keener, and after snatching us from the world’s vanities, it leads us to the love of God.”
Beautiful; and a nice complement to Luther’s meditation, oratio, and tentatio.
One quote: "However opaquely, Ignatius expresses the single most defining feature of patristic exegesis: the presumption that knowing the identity of Jesus Christ is the basis for right reading of the sacred writings of the people of Israel" (p28).
Up at Synod a couple of months back Adam Cooper and I, in our spare time, read through sections of Mariano Magrassi’s ‘Praying the Bible: An Introduction to Lectio Divina’ (The Liturgical Press, 1998 – also short – 126 pages). This book is a gem. It is a sophisticated, scholarly, and amazingly clear and simple introduction into the monastic tradition of reading the Scriptures.
One quote (which is a quote of Smaragdus): “Reading enables us to learn what we do not know, meditation enables us to retain what we have learned, and prayer enables us to live what we have retained. Reading Sacred Scripture confers on us two gifts: it makes the soul’s understanding keener, and after snatching us from the world’s vanities, it leads us to the love of God.”
Beautiful; and a nice complement to Luther’s meditation, oratio, and tentatio.
Tuesday, November 14, 2006
The Interpretation of Art
Here are two recent creations of my son, Oscar. He likes his art to have a message.
In case you can't read his script, he's saying.
"To mum and dad. Both of you area (are a) good mum and dad and you both are prit (pretty) and spshl (Special)."
"To mum. Dot (don't) be scrd (scared). I will be with you for mst (most) of yor (your) life."
Bids on these works can be made on ebay. In 50 years time.
Monday, November 13, 2006
The Open Society and Its Enemies
At the moment I'm reading the first volume of Sir Karl Popper’s ‘The Open Society and Its Enemies’ (I read the second volume a couple of years back). This wonderfully stimulating work, now regarded as a classic defence of liberal democracy, was written by Popper in New Zealand during the darkest days of the Second World War. Popper, a native of Austria, had, as a Jew, to flee from the murderous persecution of the Nazis. After the war he moved to England, where he lived until his death in 1994.
What Popper writes appeals to my small ‘l’ liberal sensibilities, but leaves me with questions.
For example, Popper makes the following statement,
“[Individualism] has become the basis of our western civiliaztion. It is the central doctrine of Christianity (‘love your neighbour’, say the Scriptures, not ‘love your tribe’); and it is the core of all ethical doctrines which have grown from our civilization and stimulated it. It is also, for instance. Kant’s central practical doctrine (‘always recognize that human individuals are ends, and do not use them as mere means to your ends’). There is no other thought which has been so powerful; in the moral development of man.”
This resonates with me, probably because it acknowledges something that is indeed in the Christian tradition, and that does indeed go back to the teaching and practice of the Lord. This focus on the value of the individual was, as it happens, also a significant feature in the writing of that great 20th century apologist, C S Lewis. Listen to Lewis in ‘The Weight of Glory’,
"There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations -these are mortal, and their life is to ours the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit -immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we have to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people that have, from the outset, taken each other seriously -no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feelings for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner -no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost the same way, for in him Christ vere latitat -the glorifier and the glorified, Glory himself -is truly hidden."
Great stuff. But Lewis writes this with a general willingness to examine the question ‘What is a human being’, whereas (as far as I can tell) for Popper this sort of ‘essentialist’ question is not only redundant, it is destructive of true respect for human individuals.
But there’s the question that I want to put to Popper: "Sir Karl, as soon as you talk of 'human individuals' you must have some practical but unstated definition of what constututes a 'human individual'. Well, in your case what is the defintion? How do I know what you are talking about? Are disabled people human beings? Are poor people human beings? Are embryos human beings?"
Popper seems to be a dedicated nominalist, and at a methodological level, at least, would, it appears, want to defer the question of the definition of a human being in favour of attempting to solve problems confronted by particular human beings. This style of argumentation seems to work only if his readers agree to defer the question explicitly, but to have an agreed and unstated implicit definition of what constitutes the essence of a human being.
Popper’s apparent dedication to deferring the ‘essential’ question seems to me to be a practical impossibility (a practical impossibility, I would say, akin to that faced by the moral relativist, who at a practical level must use ‘ought’ language). In fact there seems to be an irony: Somewhere along the line, as far as I can tell, we human beings must show at least part of our ‘essence’ by being practical essentialists; we must, in our behavior and even more or less explicitly in our speech a definition of what we consider makes a human being. We must have a practical answer to the ‘essential’ question.
But Karl is dead. I can’t get an answer from him. I’m left thinking that he smuggled an understood but unstated essentialist definition of ‘human being’ into his text but that, given his loathing of Plato’s (and Hegel’s and Marx’s) historicism, he was afraid to admit it. The best interpretation that I can put on his approach is that generally speaking we only start asking for a definition of what makes a human being when something is desperately wrong (the murder of racial minorities; the creation of embryos as means to an end; the defence of slavery). And in human history, and even in the last few days in Australia, the definition of who is part of the human community is so often restricted in the interests of the rich; the powerful; the healthy.
Well, I’ll keep reading ‘The Open Society and its Enemies’, and literally thank God that people like Popper have been dedicated enough to do the hard work of writing to defend the dignity of human beings, even if they have not understood that we all, even the smallest of us, are created in the image of God. And I’ll keep wishing that I could question Popper, and hear what he had to say.
What Popper writes appeals to my small ‘l’ liberal sensibilities, but leaves me with questions.
For example, Popper makes the following statement,
“[Individualism] has become the basis of our western civiliaztion. It is the central doctrine of Christianity (‘love your neighbour’, say the Scriptures, not ‘love your tribe’); and it is the core of all ethical doctrines which have grown from our civilization and stimulated it. It is also, for instance. Kant’s central practical doctrine (‘always recognize that human individuals are ends, and do not use them as mere means to your ends’). There is no other thought which has been so powerful; in the moral development of man.”
This resonates with me, probably because it acknowledges something that is indeed in the Christian tradition, and that does indeed go back to the teaching and practice of the Lord. This focus on the value of the individual was, as it happens, also a significant feature in the writing of that great 20th century apologist, C S Lewis. Listen to Lewis in ‘The Weight of Glory’,
"There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilisations -these are mortal, and their life is to ours the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit -immortal horrors or everlasting splendours. This does not mean that we have to be perpetually solemn. We must play. But our merriment must be of that kind (and it is, in fact, the merriest kind) which exists between people that have, from the outset, taken each other seriously -no flippancy, no superiority, no presumption. And our charity must be a real and costly love, with deep feelings for the sins in spite of which we love the sinner -no mere tolerance or indulgence which parodies love as flippancy parodies merriment. Next to the Blessed Sacrament itself, your neighbour is the holiest object presented to your senses. If he is your Christian neighbour he is holy in almost the same way, for in him Christ vere latitat -the glorifier and the glorified, Glory himself -is truly hidden."
Great stuff. But Lewis writes this with a general willingness to examine the question ‘What is a human being’, whereas (as far as I can tell) for Popper this sort of ‘essentialist’ question is not only redundant, it is destructive of true respect for human individuals.
But there’s the question that I want to put to Popper: "Sir Karl, as soon as you talk of 'human individuals' you must have some practical but unstated definition of what constututes a 'human individual'. Well, in your case what is the defintion? How do I know what you are talking about? Are disabled people human beings? Are poor people human beings? Are embryos human beings?"
Popper seems to be a dedicated nominalist, and at a methodological level, at least, would, it appears, want to defer the question of the definition of a human being in favour of attempting to solve problems confronted by particular human beings. This style of argumentation seems to work only if his readers agree to defer the question explicitly, but to have an agreed and unstated implicit definition of what constitutes the essence of a human being.
Popper’s apparent dedication to deferring the ‘essential’ question seems to me to be a practical impossibility (a practical impossibility, I would say, akin to that faced by the moral relativist, who at a practical level must use ‘ought’ language). In fact there seems to be an irony: Somewhere along the line, as far as I can tell, we human beings must show at least part of our ‘essence’ by being practical essentialists; we must, in our behavior and even more or less explicitly in our speech a definition of what we consider makes a human being. We must have a practical answer to the ‘essential’ question.
But Karl is dead. I can’t get an answer from him. I’m left thinking that he smuggled an understood but unstated essentialist definition of ‘human being’ into his text but that, given his loathing of Plato’s (and Hegel’s and Marx’s) historicism, he was afraid to admit it. The best interpretation that I can put on his approach is that generally speaking we only start asking for a definition of what makes a human being when something is desperately wrong (the murder of racial minorities; the creation of embryos as means to an end; the defence of slavery). And in human history, and even in the last few days in Australia, the definition of who is part of the human community is so often restricted in the interests of the rich; the powerful; the healthy.
Well, I’ll keep reading ‘The Open Society and its Enemies’, and literally thank God that people like Popper have been dedicated enough to do the hard work of writing to defend the dignity of human beings, even if they have not understood that we all, even the smallest of us, are created in the image of God. And I’ll keep wishing that I could question Popper, and hear what he had to say.
Wednesday, November 01, 2006
Cribbage
My mum has, this year, started to teach my boy, Oscar, to play cribbage. He’s really taken to it. This picture is from earlier in the year, and shows my son and my dad together at the card table.
Saturday, October 28, 2006
The Girls
And here's three photos of the girls. Cesca at 'pirate day'; Emmanuelle in a good mood; and Cesca after having her hair curled for 'pirate day'.
A note about 'pirate day': Only after I picked Cesca up did I realize that ‘pirate day’ actually involved the children coming to kindergarten in order to spend the day illegally downloading and burning music and movies. I must say that I felt a little foolish getting her all dressed up. Then again, the constable found my proclaimed ignorance of the nature of the activity somewhat plausible when I picked Cesca up from the station. If her teacher makes bail they'll be back as a class for 'internet fraud day' which should be a real hoot.
Tomorrow’s Stephen Bradbury?
Yesterday Oscar ‘the boy’ had his first school sports day. For a lad who would, left to his own devices, spend his waking hours doing nothing but playing ‘Demolition Derby’ and ‘Ratchet and Clank’ on the PS2, he showed remarkable athletic prowess. No doubt you have already read about the triumphant nature of his efforts in the Sport section of the Age. Perhaps one day, should the real contenders crash in a heap just before the finish line, he will be good to win a gold medal at the Olympics.
The real charm of his performance was his ‘never give up’ and ‘never think things through’ attitude. In two of the races that I saw, after he went over the finish line he turned around and headed, at top speed, back to the start, with, on at least one occasion, his competitors in train. I could only yell out in encouragement ‘Go Forest’.
For this post I’ve included a picture of the boy from a couple of months back. He was sick, and so was still (i.e. not moving, and therefore photographable).
Friday, October 06, 2006
Pastors' Conference
I've just returned from Pastors' Conference and Synod. When I get some time I'll do my first real blog on the whole thing. For the moment, here's the presentation that I gave to the pastors.
General Pastors’ Conference
Why I am committed to upholding the current public teaching of the LCA
I’ll start with a scriptural example of commitment, and the warning it gives to me about thinking or speaking in terms of binding myself to, or committing myself to, the teaching of the church.
The Lord, on the night of his betrayal, spoke of the way that his own disciples would desert him. He taught plainly; his meaning was clear enough to evoke a response from the disciples. St Peter, who had already made a God-given confession of faith in the Lord, was bold: ‘Though all become deserters because of you, I will never desert you’. Even after the Lord then assured St Peter ‘Truly I tell you, this very night, before the cock crows, you will deny me three times’ St Peter remained committed. He said: ‘Even though I must die with you, I will not deny you’. And so said all the disciples (Matthew 26:31-36).
To me this is one of the clearest examples of human commitment to the Lord in Scripture. I don’t get the sense that St Peter and the other disciples were speaking insincerely, or that they had the slightest doubt regarding their commitment to Christ. Yet we all know how the night unfolded. The Shepherd was struck, the sheep did flee; St Peter denied his Lord when challenged by a mere serving-girl.
The disciples’ own behaviour suggests to me that even the most heartfelt human commitment is a faltering thing. St Peter and the other disciples needed to be restored to a right relationship with Christ, based not primarily on their fidelity to him, but on his fidelity to them. They had to learn to order their commitment in relation to his. On this basis I want to make clear that my commitment to the LCA’s teaching, although real and heartfelt, is not of great significance to me. I want to walk the path of discipleship with the Apostles, and this seems to me to involve a frank acknowledgement of the ultimate weakness of my commitment to the Lord, and so also of the ultimate weakness of my commitment to my understanding of his teaching concerning ordination.
I’ll now use an analogy that will hopefully clarify how in practice I experience God’s word binding me in conscience in a way that involves my commitment, but transcends it.
To the best of my knowledge I am deeply committed to my wife, and to my marriage. I would like to think that I love my wife above all other people, and that nothing could lead me to forsake her or be unfaithful to her. Likewise I would like to believe that my commitment to my marriage is rock solid, and has the strength to withstand the temptations that come my way. I think this experience of commitment is important and significant, and that without it my married life would be in trouble.
Nevertheless, when it comes to trusting that my marriage has a future I ultimately look not to my own strength of commitment, but to the words of the Lord. He says, ‘What God has joined together, let no one separate’. Not what human love or commitment has joined together, but what God has joined together. And this is a joy to me. When I hold on to my wife in love and faithfulness I know in conscience that this is what Jesus wants me to do. When I am tempted to covet other women, I know in conscience that this is forbidden to me. My wife, and no other, is God’s gift to me as a marriage partner, even when my love and commitment falter. This gives me great sense of liberation and lightness: God can hold my marriage together in a way that I can not. The Lord Jesus, by binding my conscience through his word, brings his life and power to me and to my marriage.
Why the words of Jesus of Nazareth should have such power in my life is, ultimately, a mystery to me. I experience it as a reality, as something that is consistent with the workings of my reason, but as a reality that I receive by faith.
In employing this analogy I’m not saying that faithful marriage represents the LCA’s current teaching on ordination, and that its opposite represents the move to change this teaching. I’m saying that just as I experience that God’s word prohibits me from infidelity to my wife even when my commitment to my wife is weak or non existent, so I experience that God’s word prohibits me from sanctioning the ordination of women to the public ministry, even when my commitment to this word is weak or non-existent. The analogy is in the way that I experience being bound in conscience even when my personal commitment is in question.
Let me press this analogy a little further. If someone could persuade me that I was mistaken in thinking that the words of the Lord regarding marriage apply to my marriage, or if they could persuade me that I had misunderstood the Lord’s words in a fundamental way, then, of course, my conscience would no longer be bound as it is now. I would be free to adopt a different attitude to my wife and my marriage. Likewise if someone could persuade me that the apostolic prohibitions do not apply to the church here and now, or that I had misunderstood them in a fundamental way, then my conscience would no longer be bound to oppose the ordination of women as it is now. In both examples I could change my commitment in good conscience, although, of course, having good conscience in itself would not make me right before God.
Up to this point in my presentation I think that I’m describing an experience of God’s Word and the place of conscience under God’s Word that I hope is understandable to some extent to most or all of us here. It seems to me that three facts arise from this that are worth noting. 1. There are people in the LCA who experience being conscience bound by their understanding of God’s Word to work for change in the teaching on ordination. 2. There are people who experience being conscience bound by their understanding of God’s Word to oppose such change. And 3. There are also perhaps many people who do not experience being conscience bound one way or the other. This third point seems to be significant in thinking through how a proposal should be put to this conference and the general convention.
Very well, after all this, let me come back to the question that has been put to me : why I am committed to upholding the current public teaching of the LCA? Why do I experience that in conscience I am bound to uphold this teaching?
In one sense it is a mystery. That the words of the Lord Jesus have a living and liberating power over my life is something that I cannot explain, only describe. And, of course I must also openly acknowledge that subconscious factors may contribute to my outlook on this issue. For all I know my upholding of the LCA’s teaching on the apostolic prohibition stems from a repressed hostility to my mother, who is a public proponent of women’s ordination. Well, why not? The Scriptures themselves speak of the inscrutability of the human will. I hardly feel qualified to exempt myself from this inscrutability.
Even so, I am persuaded that the Apostolic prohibitions that are used in our public teaching is the teaching of the Lord Jesus, and that this teaching is not just for certain congregations in the early church, but also for the church in our own time and place. I acknowledge that the way these words apply in our context is a matter to be settled by prudent, evangelical application in our congregations. Nevertheless, I experience my being bound in conscience to this word as a mystery in my life, akin to my being bound in conscience to the Lord’s word to me in baptism, or the absolution, or the Lord’s Supper, or, indeed, my marriage.
I don’t feel ashamed to stand here and say that my commitment to the teaching of the LCA is ultimately a mystery to me. Reality is, after all, a mystery. For me, one of the deepest mysteries of life is the fact that God created us human beings as male and female (Genesis 1:26-27). Although I can rejoice in the way that we human beings, as male and female, are together made in God’s image, I can’t ultimately explain why this should be the case. I simply receive the fact of it in joy and thanks, and meditate about what it means for us in the church to live as men and women with faith in Christ.
I also don’t feel ashamed of the mystery of what seems to me to be the prohibition of woman from the public ministry. It is clear to me the teaching of the LCA regarding the exclusion of women from the ministry can be difficult to explain, particularly in our society where women are welcomed into roles formerly filled only by men, and men take up work in roles formerly assigned to women. In that sense I can understand that our public teaching may constitute a scandal for some, and that for some it may be a cause of shame as we proclaim the gospel in our communities. But I have a confidence, if you like a commitment, that this scandal is part of the scandal of the cross, and something in which we may actually glory. I understand that when we pastors of the Lutheran Church of Australia are called to promise publicly to teach this perhaps unpopular doctrine, it is because the church understands that it is the gracious will of Christ for His people. In other words, my take is that the LCA has understood that this teaching goes back to the Lord, and that He gives it to bless us rather than curse us.
In our history as the LCA we have seen two parts of the Bible as particularly significant in determining what the right teaching and practice is regarding this matter: 1 Corinthians 14:33b-38 (‘As in all the churches of the saints, the women should keep silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak…’), and 1 Timothy 2:11-15 (‘I do not permit a woman to teach or have authority over a man…’). Of course the interpretation of these two passages constitutes the basis of much of the debate that we have been having. But I keep coming back to the words in 1 Corinthians: ‘What I write is a command of the Lord’. I’m still persuaded that we are called to recognize the command in Corinthians as a command not of St Paul only, but of the Lord. And, although I continue to be persuaded that the public office of the ministry as it is exercised in the LCA does conform to the teaching of the Scriptures and the Confessions, I welcome debate on this issue as helpful to our church in distinguishing but not separating the priesthood of all believers and the public office of the ministry.
I am still persuaded that the exclusion of women from the public ministry is consistent with the whole sweep of Scripture, and with the teaching and practice of the Lord. When it comes to both men and women being of equal dignity the witness of Jesus in the Gospels is in no way unclear. Jesus, in His example and word, understood that men and women together are made in God’s image. Jesus broke with many expectations and sexist human customs of the day, without fear for what people might have thought or said (e.g. Luke 11:38-42 - teaching a woman; Matthew 9:20-26 - dealing graciously with a ceremonially unclean woman; Luke 8:1-3 - having women travel with Him and His disciples). In this he gave a definitive revelation of the law of love. On the other hand, as far as I can tell, this did not mean that Jesus thought the distinction between the sexes unimportant when it comes to proclaiming publicly the gospel. As God in the flesh, the Lord freely chose only men to serve as public ministers of His Word and Sacraments. The Lord chose only Jewish men, but evidently the Apostles didn’t see this distinguishing ethnic mark as a necessary characteristic for those publicly proclaiming the Gospel (for example, we think of Apollos and Timothy, and the witness of the Apostolic Fathers).
In my understanding it was on the basis of the Lord’s own teaching and action that the church, since the earliest days, has constantly taught that only men (but not only Jewish men) were eligible to serve in the public ministry (eg Acts 1:15-26 – the calling of Matthias ‘one of these men’ to replace Judas). In fact until the 20th century the Lutheran churches around the world ordained only men to the public ministry. Even today the vast majority of Christians belong to churches that ordain only men. The single largest group of Christians (the Roman Catholic Church), clearly and publicly teach that on the basis of God’s Word they have no authority to ordain women. This is of particular significance to me in relation to the fact that we Lutherans, after centuries of controversy, recently reached remarkable theological agreement with the Roman Catholics on Justification.
As an aside, I find it noteworthy that the Catholic Church has consistently upheld the exclusion of women from the public ministry while maintaining, what appears from my admittedly limited study, a consistent magisterial teaching against slavery. So when I read that the Western church was slow to speak out against slavery, I have questions. Maybe English speaking Christians were slow to speak out, but for me the Western church means primarily the Roman Catholic Church. And Catholic magisterial teaching against slavery seems to go back to before the Middle Ages. Certainly in the Middle Ages the great and representative Catholic theologian St Thomas Aquinas placed slavery in opposition to natural law, and found no natural basis for the enslavement of people from any religion or race. In the Reformation Pope Paul III, who presided from 1534-1549, publicly and authoritatively taught that Satan was the cause of slavery, and imposed the penalty of excommunication on those who were engaging in the slave trade in the New World. Of course those who were the target of such teaching did not listen; but what’s new? It’s the public and authoritative teaching that interests me.
The fact that women were excluded from authoritative public proclamation of the Gospel by Jesus, by the Apostles, by the Church throughout its history, by the Lutheran churches around the world until relatively recently, and by the clear majority of Christians until this day is particularly significant to me when I consider the fact that women have always played a vital role in the life of the church. From the Virgin Mary onward women have been instrumental in bringing Jesus to the church and the world (e.g. Mark 16:1-8 – the women called to announce the resurrection; John 4:1-42 - the Samaritan woman’s testimony concerning Jesus to her fellow townspeople; 1 Corinthians 16:19 – the church meeting at the house of Prisca and her husband Aquila; 2 Timothy 1:3-7 – the heritage of faith from Lois to Eunice to Timothy). In more recent times, the witness of Bo Giertz on this issue is also significant for me. In his The Hammer of God this famous opponent of the ordination of women was able to portray in a powerful way a picture of men and women, ordained and lay, proclaiming the gospel in their different historical, cultural and vocational contexts.
There’s one more thing. I find it a noteworthy fact that many churches that have ordained women to the ministry have also gone on to ordain practicing homosexual men and women into the ministry, or are currently debating the issue in their synods and church gatherings. Given the fact of the correlation of these two issues in the history of the church, and the given the fact of similar theological argumentation on the basis of Scripture for both issues, I think that in our LCA debate on the ordination of women we would be aided by having an agreed statement on how the two issues are in no way related.
I expect that over the next days we will hear many of the arguments for and against our church’s teaching concerning the application of the apostolic prohibitions in Scripture regarding the ordination of women to the public office of the ministry. I expect that many, probably most, perhaps all of the arguments that we will hear are arguments with which we are already familiar. It would be difficult for me to say of any single argument: here is the reason that I interpret the prohibitions to be binding on me in conscience.
OK. Let’s say the LCA in convention decides in synod to change its public teaching on the ordination of women. Where does that leave someone like me?
First of all a few comments. What gives us our unity is not our synodical organization, but our acceptance of a common body of teaching. Our unity is based not on a common cultural heritage, or on a commitment to the LCA as an institution, or on a common political outlook or even on the fact that this the church in which God has happened to place us and nurture us in faith in Christ. Rather, as is evident in our rites of baptism, first communion, confirmation, and particularly in our rite of ordination, our unity is in a common, publicly accessible, and clearly articulated teaching, as set down in the Lutheran Confessions and the Theses of Agreement. This teaching includes our current position on the prohibition of ordination of women to the public ministry.
Therefore, if the LCA changes this clearly articulated teaching on ordination, it disrupts the current foundation of our unity, unless there is consensus, indeed unanimity, for the change.
Personally speaking, such a change would leave me in formal, outward fellowship with people and congregations who, as far as I can tell in conscience, would be directly disobeying the word of God. Could I stay in fellowship with Christians and congregations who settled into this disobedience, and let it shape the church’s practice of ordination and ministry? I can’t answer this question with any clarity or certainty, and in principle I have not given my thoughts over to what I would do if such a decision were taken. But I can imagine someone saying something like this to me:
“Fraser, that you have qualms of conscience is perhaps understandable, but you are not interpreting Scripture correctly. You need to submit your conscience to the teaching of the church. Think about it: You didn’t make yourself a pastor, did you? You were called by God through the church, and ordained by the church. Now the same church has decided that women, too, may serve with you as pastors in the church. Be guided by the wisdom of the church; don’t be proud and hold on stubbornly to your own interpretation. Let the Spirit lead you in humility to accept the decision of your brothers and sisters, and take up your ministry with joy, knowing that now you are free to proclaim the gospel in a more inclusive way.”
Frankly this sort of talk could win me over. But for it to give me true peace in conscience I would have to believe that the doctrinal decisions of the LCA gathered in General Convention have authority to bind my conscience along with the conscience-binding words of the Lord. I would have to believe that I could stand before God and say: “Lord, it seems to me that your Word prohibits women from serving as pastors, but the LCA, speaking in your name, has declared that my interpretation is not correct. So I let the word of the LCA guide me, and I stand before you confident that I have your approval.” But at the moment I am not convinced that such a confidence would be well founded.
General Pastors’ Conference
Why I am committed to upholding the current public teaching of the LCA
I’ll start with a scriptural example of commitment, and the warning it gives to me about thinking or speaking in terms of binding myself to, or committing myself to, the teaching of the church.
The Lord, on the night of his betrayal, spoke of the way that his own disciples would desert him. He taught plainly; his meaning was clear enough to evoke a response from the disciples. St Peter, who had already made a God-given confession of faith in the Lord, was bold: ‘Though all become deserters because of you, I will never desert you’. Even after the Lord then assured St Peter ‘Truly I tell you, this very night, before the cock crows, you will deny me three times’ St Peter remained committed. He said: ‘Even though I must die with you, I will not deny you’. And so said all the disciples (Matthew 26:31-36).
To me this is one of the clearest examples of human commitment to the Lord in Scripture. I don’t get the sense that St Peter and the other disciples were speaking insincerely, or that they had the slightest doubt regarding their commitment to Christ. Yet we all know how the night unfolded. The Shepherd was struck, the sheep did flee; St Peter denied his Lord when challenged by a mere serving-girl.
The disciples’ own behaviour suggests to me that even the most heartfelt human commitment is a faltering thing. St Peter and the other disciples needed to be restored to a right relationship with Christ, based not primarily on their fidelity to him, but on his fidelity to them. They had to learn to order their commitment in relation to his. On this basis I want to make clear that my commitment to the LCA’s teaching, although real and heartfelt, is not of great significance to me. I want to walk the path of discipleship with the Apostles, and this seems to me to involve a frank acknowledgement of the ultimate weakness of my commitment to the Lord, and so also of the ultimate weakness of my commitment to my understanding of his teaching concerning ordination.
I’ll now use an analogy that will hopefully clarify how in practice I experience God’s word binding me in conscience in a way that involves my commitment, but transcends it.
To the best of my knowledge I am deeply committed to my wife, and to my marriage. I would like to think that I love my wife above all other people, and that nothing could lead me to forsake her or be unfaithful to her. Likewise I would like to believe that my commitment to my marriage is rock solid, and has the strength to withstand the temptations that come my way. I think this experience of commitment is important and significant, and that without it my married life would be in trouble.
Nevertheless, when it comes to trusting that my marriage has a future I ultimately look not to my own strength of commitment, but to the words of the Lord. He says, ‘What God has joined together, let no one separate’. Not what human love or commitment has joined together, but what God has joined together. And this is a joy to me. When I hold on to my wife in love and faithfulness I know in conscience that this is what Jesus wants me to do. When I am tempted to covet other women, I know in conscience that this is forbidden to me. My wife, and no other, is God’s gift to me as a marriage partner, even when my love and commitment falter. This gives me great sense of liberation and lightness: God can hold my marriage together in a way that I can not. The Lord Jesus, by binding my conscience through his word, brings his life and power to me and to my marriage.
Why the words of Jesus of Nazareth should have such power in my life is, ultimately, a mystery to me. I experience it as a reality, as something that is consistent with the workings of my reason, but as a reality that I receive by faith.
In employing this analogy I’m not saying that faithful marriage represents the LCA’s current teaching on ordination, and that its opposite represents the move to change this teaching. I’m saying that just as I experience that God’s word prohibits me from infidelity to my wife even when my commitment to my wife is weak or non existent, so I experience that God’s word prohibits me from sanctioning the ordination of women to the public ministry, even when my commitment to this word is weak or non-existent. The analogy is in the way that I experience being bound in conscience even when my personal commitment is in question.
Let me press this analogy a little further. If someone could persuade me that I was mistaken in thinking that the words of the Lord regarding marriage apply to my marriage, or if they could persuade me that I had misunderstood the Lord’s words in a fundamental way, then, of course, my conscience would no longer be bound as it is now. I would be free to adopt a different attitude to my wife and my marriage. Likewise if someone could persuade me that the apostolic prohibitions do not apply to the church here and now, or that I had misunderstood them in a fundamental way, then my conscience would no longer be bound to oppose the ordination of women as it is now. In both examples I could change my commitment in good conscience, although, of course, having good conscience in itself would not make me right before God.
Up to this point in my presentation I think that I’m describing an experience of God’s Word and the place of conscience under God’s Word that I hope is understandable to some extent to most or all of us here. It seems to me that three facts arise from this that are worth noting. 1. There are people in the LCA who experience being conscience bound by their understanding of God’s Word to work for change in the teaching on ordination. 2. There are people who experience being conscience bound by their understanding of God’s Word to oppose such change. And 3. There are also perhaps many people who do not experience being conscience bound one way or the other. This third point seems to be significant in thinking through how a proposal should be put to this conference and the general convention.
Very well, after all this, let me come back to the question that has been put to me : why I am committed to upholding the current public teaching of the LCA? Why do I experience that in conscience I am bound to uphold this teaching?
In one sense it is a mystery. That the words of the Lord Jesus have a living and liberating power over my life is something that I cannot explain, only describe. And, of course I must also openly acknowledge that subconscious factors may contribute to my outlook on this issue. For all I know my upholding of the LCA’s teaching on the apostolic prohibition stems from a repressed hostility to my mother, who is a public proponent of women’s ordination. Well, why not? The Scriptures themselves speak of the inscrutability of the human will. I hardly feel qualified to exempt myself from this inscrutability.
Even so, I am persuaded that the Apostolic prohibitions that are used in our public teaching is the teaching of the Lord Jesus, and that this teaching is not just for certain congregations in the early church, but also for the church in our own time and place. I acknowledge that the way these words apply in our context is a matter to be settled by prudent, evangelical application in our congregations. Nevertheless, I experience my being bound in conscience to this word as a mystery in my life, akin to my being bound in conscience to the Lord’s word to me in baptism, or the absolution, or the Lord’s Supper, or, indeed, my marriage.
I don’t feel ashamed to stand here and say that my commitment to the teaching of the LCA is ultimately a mystery to me. Reality is, after all, a mystery. For me, one of the deepest mysteries of life is the fact that God created us human beings as male and female (Genesis 1:26-27). Although I can rejoice in the way that we human beings, as male and female, are together made in God’s image, I can’t ultimately explain why this should be the case. I simply receive the fact of it in joy and thanks, and meditate about what it means for us in the church to live as men and women with faith in Christ.
I also don’t feel ashamed of the mystery of what seems to me to be the prohibition of woman from the public ministry. It is clear to me the teaching of the LCA regarding the exclusion of women from the ministry can be difficult to explain, particularly in our society where women are welcomed into roles formerly filled only by men, and men take up work in roles formerly assigned to women. In that sense I can understand that our public teaching may constitute a scandal for some, and that for some it may be a cause of shame as we proclaim the gospel in our communities. But I have a confidence, if you like a commitment, that this scandal is part of the scandal of the cross, and something in which we may actually glory. I understand that when we pastors of the Lutheran Church of Australia are called to promise publicly to teach this perhaps unpopular doctrine, it is because the church understands that it is the gracious will of Christ for His people. In other words, my take is that the LCA has understood that this teaching goes back to the Lord, and that He gives it to bless us rather than curse us.
In our history as the LCA we have seen two parts of the Bible as particularly significant in determining what the right teaching and practice is regarding this matter: 1 Corinthians 14:33b-38 (‘As in all the churches of the saints, the women should keep silent in the churches. For they are not permitted to speak…’), and 1 Timothy 2:11-15 (‘I do not permit a woman to teach or have authority over a man…’). Of course the interpretation of these two passages constitutes the basis of much of the debate that we have been having. But I keep coming back to the words in 1 Corinthians: ‘What I write is a command of the Lord’. I’m still persuaded that we are called to recognize the command in Corinthians as a command not of St Paul only, but of the Lord. And, although I continue to be persuaded that the public office of the ministry as it is exercised in the LCA does conform to the teaching of the Scriptures and the Confessions, I welcome debate on this issue as helpful to our church in distinguishing but not separating the priesthood of all believers and the public office of the ministry.
I am still persuaded that the exclusion of women from the public ministry is consistent with the whole sweep of Scripture, and with the teaching and practice of the Lord. When it comes to both men and women being of equal dignity the witness of Jesus in the Gospels is in no way unclear. Jesus, in His example and word, understood that men and women together are made in God’s image. Jesus broke with many expectations and sexist human customs of the day, without fear for what people might have thought or said (e.g. Luke 11:38-42 - teaching a woman; Matthew 9:20-26 - dealing graciously with a ceremonially unclean woman; Luke 8:1-3 - having women travel with Him and His disciples). In this he gave a definitive revelation of the law of love. On the other hand, as far as I can tell, this did not mean that Jesus thought the distinction between the sexes unimportant when it comes to proclaiming publicly the gospel. As God in the flesh, the Lord freely chose only men to serve as public ministers of His Word and Sacraments. The Lord chose only Jewish men, but evidently the Apostles didn’t see this distinguishing ethnic mark as a necessary characteristic for those publicly proclaiming the Gospel (for example, we think of Apollos and Timothy, and the witness of the Apostolic Fathers).
In my understanding it was on the basis of the Lord’s own teaching and action that the church, since the earliest days, has constantly taught that only men (but not only Jewish men) were eligible to serve in the public ministry (eg Acts 1:15-26 – the calling of Matthias ‘one of these men’ to replace Judas). In fact until the 20th century the Lutheran churches around the world ordained only men to the public ministry. Even today the vast majority of Christians belong to churches that ordain only men. The single largest group of Christians (the Roman Catholic Church), clearly and publicly teach that on the basis of God’s Word they have no authority to ordain women. This is of particular significance to me in relation to the fact that we Lutherans, after centuries of controversy, recently reached remarkable theological agreement with the Roman Catholics on Justification.
As an aside, I find it noteworthy that the Catholic Church has consistently upheld the exclusion of women from the public ministry while maintaining, what appears from my admittedly limited study, a consistent magisterial teaching against slavery. So when I read that the Western church was slow to speak out against slavery, I have questions. Maybe English speaking Christians were slow to speak out, but for me the Western church means primarily the Roman Catholic Church. And Catholic magisterial teaching against slavery seems to go back to before the Middle Ages. Certainly in the Middle Ages the great and representative Catholic theologian St Thomas Aquinas placed slavery in opposition to natural law, and found no natural basis for the enslavement of people from any religion or race. In the Reformation Pope Paul III, who presided from 1534-1549, publicly and authoritatively taught that Satan was the cause of slavery, and imposed the penalty of excommunication on those who were engaging in the slave trade in the New World. Of course those who were the target of such teaching did not listen; but what’s new? It’s the public and authoritative teaching that interests me.
The fact that women were excluded from authoritative public proclamation of the Gospel by Jesus, by the Apostles, by the Church throughout its history, by the Lutheran churches around the world until relatively recently, and by the clear majority of Christians until this day is particularly significant to me when I consider the fact that women have always played a vital role in the life of the church. From the Virgin Mary onward women have been instrumental in bringing Jesus to the church and the world (e.g. Mark 16:1-8 – the women called to announce the resurrection; John 4:1-42 - the Samaritan woman’s testimony concerning Jesus to her fellow townspeople; 1 Corinthians 16:19 – the church meeting at the house of Prisca and her husband Aquila; 2 Timothy 1:3-7 – the heritage of faith from Lois to Eunice to Timothy). In more recent times, the witness of Bo Giertz on this issue is also significant for me. In his The Hammer of God this famous opponent of the ordination of women was able to portray in a powerful way a picture of men and women, ordained and lay, proclaiming the gospel in their different historical, cultural and vocational contexts.
There’s one more thing. I find it a noteworthy fact that many churches that have ordained women to the ministry have also gone on to ordain practicing homosexual men and women into the ministry, or are currently debating the issue in their synods and church gatherings. Given the fact of the correlation of these two issues in the history of the church, and the given the fact of similar theological argumentation on the basis of Scripture for both issues, I think that in our LCA debate on the ordination of women we would be aided by having an agreed statement on how the two issues are in no way related.
I expect that over the next days we will hear many of the arguments for and against our church’s teaching concerning the application of the apostolic prohibitions in Scripture regarding the ordination of women to the public office of the ministry. I expect that many, probably most, perhaps all of the arguments that we will hear are arguments with which we are already familiar. It would be difficult for me to say of any single argument: here is the reason that I interpret the prohibitions to be binding on me in conscience.
OK. Let’s say the LCA in convention decides in synod to change its public teaching on the ordination of women. Where does that leave someone like me?
First of all a few comments. What gives us our unity is not our synodical organization, but our acceptance of a common body of teaching. Our unity is based not on a common cultural heritage, or on a commitment to the LCA as an institution, or on a common political outlook or even on the fact that this the church in which God has happened to place us and nurture us in faith in Christ. Rather, as is evident in our rites of baptism, first communion, confirmation, and particularly in our rite of ordination, our unity is in a common, publicly accessible, and clearly articulated teaching, as set down in the Lutheran Confessions and the Theses of Agreement. This teaching includes our current position on the prohibition of ordination of women to the public ministry.
Therefore, if the LCA changes this clearly articulated teaching on ordination, it disrupts the current foundation of our unity, unless there is consensus, indeed unanimity, for the change.
Personally speaking, such a change would leave me in formal, outward fellowship with people and congregations who, as far as I can tell in conscience, would be directly disobeying the word of God. Could I stay in fellowship with Christians and congregations who settled into this disobedience, and let it shape the church’s practice of ordination and ministry? I can’t answer this question with any clarity or certainty, and in principle I have not given my thoughts over to what I would do if such a decision were taken. But I can imagine someone saying something like this to me:
“Fraser, that you have qualms of conscience is perhaps understandable, but you are not interpreting Scripture correctly. You need to submit your conscience to the teaching of the church. Think about it: You didn’t make yourself a pastor, did you? You were called by God through the church, and ordained by the church. Now the same church has decided that women, too, may serve with you as pastors in the church. Be guided by the wisdom of the church; don’t be proud and hold on stubbornly to your own interpretation. Let the Spirit lead you in humility to accept the decision of your brothers and sisters, and take up your ministry with joy, knowing that now you are free to proclaim the gospel in a more inclusive way.”
Frankly this sort of talk could win me over. But for it to give me true peace in conscience I would have to believe that the doctrinal decisions of the LCA gathered in General Convention have authority to bind my conscience along with the conscience-binding words of the Lord. I would have to believe that I could stand before God and say: “Lord, it seems to me that your Word prohibits women from serving as pastors, but the LCA, speaking in your name, has declared that my interpretation is not correct. So I let the word of the LCA guide me, and I stand before you confident that I have your approval.” But at the moment I am not convinced that such a confidence would be well founded.
Monday, September 25, 2006
More on the Baptism
A few more pictures from the baptism. First, Emmanuelle in prayerful repose, then her being baptised, then her receiving the Lord's Prayer.
Sunday, September 24, 2006
Emmanuelle Magdalen
Today we celebrated the baptism of our little baby daughter. As part of the rite her name, Emmanuelle Magdalen, was announced for the first time to family and friends.
We are very thankful for all the family and friends who could join us in the celebrations. The church was full to overflowing, and Pastor Greg Pitesch, the district president, came up to minister the baptism. He also preached and led the Eucharistic liturgy. It was a very joyful service, and we will remember it for our whole lives.
We had a whole sheep on a spit for lunch afterwards, as well as spit-roasted pork and beef. No meat eaters and wine drinkers went home hungry or thirsty!
In the photo are the Godparents (Vinni Ramm, Dania (Danica) Ahern, Jemma Eden, and Sue (Suedom) Westhorp); the parents; Emmanuelle; and Pastor Greg.
Please join with us in giving thanks to God for the safe birth of our little daughter, Emmanuelle Magdalen, and for the gift of baptism by which she has been adopted into God's family!
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
A Little Baby
And here she is again. Looking well fed, don't you think? Actually, she was a little overcooked in the womb, but she doesn't seem too upset.
By the way, the posting times that are displayed seem to be the times my posts hit the USA. The baby is sleeping rather well, really.
Gentle Wah
Not the name of a chinese evangelist, just a description of our little baby's cry. Here's a new picture of her for you all to enjoy.
Sunday, September 17, 2006
Conscience, Dissent, and Unity in the Church
Back in May I was asked to give a talk to the Victorian and Tasmanian District Pastors' Conference, on the above topic. If you are interested in what I had to say, read on...
Conscience, Dissent, and Unity in the Church
Presented to the Victorian District Pastors’ Conference, May 2006, by Fraser Pearce, Pastor of Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Bendigo
Speaking in Good Conscience
In the Gospel according to St Matthew, we hear these words of the Lord: ‘I tell you, on the day of judgment you will have to give account for every careless word you utter; for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned’ (Matthew 12:36-37). These words, spoken by the Lord, stand as a warning to us. We can be tempted in life to treat the words that we speak with a levity that does not take into account the judgment of God. When we fall into this temptation we speak words that we know, in our conscience, while being plausible and winsome to the people who hear us, do not have the approval of God. When we fall into this temptation we use our tongues to serve the god of human approval, rather than to bless the true God by speaking what is true.
Confessing the Faith in Good Conscience
Care in the use of words, and the role of conscience in discerning what we may say with the approval of God, is of particular significance when it comes to the confession of faith that we make before God and the world. When we confess our faith we are not speaking words lightly. Instead we are taking on our lips declarations of faith that are made, or at least should be made, soberly and with awareness of our accountability to God. The quotation from the psalms that forms the superscription to the Augsburg Confession sums up this attitude: ‘I will also speak of your decrees before kings, and shall not be put to shame’ (Psalm 119:46). That is: our public confession before the world does not bring us shame before God, because it is made of the basis of His Word and in good conscience.
Confessing the Faith and Salvation
Scripture brings out the good news of our accountability to God; St Paul in Romans teaches that God works His salvation in us by giving us both the belief in our hearts and the confession of our lips –by bringing together the spiritual belief and the bodily confession (Romans 10:9-10; c.f. 2 Corinthians 5:10; Romans 2:6-11). In fact we can say that when our outward actions conform to our inward beliefs in Christ Jesus, we have a foretaste of what the Apostles’ Creed means when it speaks of the ‘resurrection of the body’: our bodies are joined to the supernatural confession of faith, and so become bearers of God’s blessing to ourselves and the world (Matthew 16:13-20; 1 Corinthians 12:3; Luke 1:26-56). We are not only forgiven sinners, we are ‘a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that [we] may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light’ (1 Peter 2:9).
Bodily Confession of Spiritual Truth
In this paper I will be taking up the Scriptural teaching that what we do with our bodies has spiritual significance, and that we make our bodily confession of faith primarily in the presence of God. In other words I will be working with the understanding that what we speak in our bodies in the temporal world is in fact loaded with eschatological significance, and that this fact is the stimulus for the great joy that we can take in confessing the church’s faith.
In this paper I will also be dealing with the reality of dissent –with the fact that situations may arise in which we may not be able to confess the public teaching of our church in good conscience. We will see that from a Christian point of view dissent does not focus on how an individual asserts their rights, or on how they effect their independence from the power structure of the group. Rather we will see that it focuses on the rupture that is caused when the dissenter refuses to confess that teaching which is the basis for fellowship of pulpit and altar.
From this we will see how dissent from public teaching is linked with the unity of the church, and we will deal with the question of what to do when someone cannot in good conscience confess the unifying public teaching of their church. This is a particularly significant question for pastors, who are required to make public vows regarding their fidelity to the public teaching of the church, and who are held especially accountable by God for false teaching or corrupt practice (James 3:1). In our context one clear practical question becomes: Can a pastor who is in dissent from the publica doctrina of the LCA remain in fellowship with the LCA? But before that question is addressed, we need to examine the relationship of the individual believer to the church in the act of confessing the faith.
The Church’s Publica Doctrina
As pastors we are called by the church publicly to teach and confess not our own opinions or our own particular exegeses of biblical texts, but the publica doctrina of the church as it is confessed in the Book of Concord, and as it is explicated in the Theses of Agreement and Doctrinal Statements and Theological Opinions of the LCA. Not all the issues dealt with in the church’s publica doctrina are of equal weight, and, as we shall see below, in principle our doctrinal and theological statements and opinions are patient of reform on the basis of Scripture. But, until such a time as our doctrinal statements and theological opinions are changed by general pastors’ conference together with general convention, we are bound, at least in our capacity as pastors of the LCA, to teach and act in accordance with them. Practically speaking, although we may have questions concerning aspects of the publica doctrina, when it comes to what we proclaim from the pulpit or teach the congregations in our care we are bound in conscience and by our ordination and installation vows to submit our private judgments concerning the publica doctrina to the judgment of the church.
It is a hallmark of Lutheran theology that care is taken in formulating and defining the publica doctrina so as only to bind consciences on issues that have clear divine commands or prohibitions. It is true that when it comes to the ecumenical creeds and Confessions of our church, we are called to make a quia rather than quatenus confession. That is, we are called to commit ourselves before God and the world to the contents of the Book of Concord because they are true expositions of the Word of God. We bind ourselves in conscience to this confession of faith; that is, we submit in conscience to the teaching contained in these confessions, and rely on the doctrinal content of the confessions to set the boundaries for the proper conduct of our worship and life. On issues that are dealt with in the Theses of Agreement and the Doctrinal Statements and Theological Opinions of the Lutheran Church of Australia, however, there is possibility for reform. In our current context, when we are facing the possibility of change in the publica doctrina of the LCA, it is helpful to look again at the ‘Status on the Theses of Agreement and Other Doctrinal Statements’[1]:
I. In the exercise of their teaching function, whether dealing with a group or a congregation or with individuals, pastors of the LCA should not run counter to the letter and the spirit of the Theses of Agreement.
2. The Theses of Agreement, the fruit of prayerful labours extending over many years, have been adopted in all seriousness and in good faith by both the former UELCA and ELCA as a unifying document. They should be respected and treated accordingly. Should amendments become desirable in the course of time, such amendments would have to be submitted to the entire Church after thorough theological examination and discussion. Meanwhile, a deliberate disregard of the Theses in teaching and preaching would appear as evidence of bad faith, and would constitute a serious threat to the unity of the Church. There may, of course, be inadvertent disregard of the Theses due to ignorance of their content.
3. It is clearly the right and the duty of the Church, in the face of current challenges, to define how it understands the Scriptures and the Confessions. Therefore, explanations and amendments of the Theses, as well as any other statements of a doctrinal nature, submitted to the entire Church after thorough theological examination and discussion and adopted by it, must be accorded the same authority in the Church as the Theses themselves (see l and 2 above).
The process of debate in the church regarding women’s ordination over the past decade and more, including prolonged discussions at pastors conferences and synods, have been ways the LCA has attempted to live according to its own teaching. This debate has been, as we well know, the cause of much heartache for many of our members, and much confusion on the part of pastors and the laity. Many people have spent time agonizing over how they can reconcile their consciences to the publica doctrina as it does exist, or as it might exist in the future.
Conscience and Publica Doctrina
One temptation that we face when we experience difficulties in accepting the publica doctrina is to pit conscience against the publica doctrina of the church, and to assert that the claims of conscience are superior to the confession that we pastors are called to make. In this model the voice of conscience and the publica doctrina are seen as competing authorities, with conscience being the final court of appeal. At first glance this model seems not simply to be attractive when we face difficulties with the publica doctrina, but to be an accurate reflection of reality. After all, it is true that God calls us always to obey conscience, and that to go against conscience is in all cases to risk spiritual harm (more on this below). It is also true that the content of the church’s publica doctrina is patient of reform, and that at times fidelity to the Word of God may mean agitating for change in the publica doctrina. Then why is this model unhelpful? Why is it misleading to see conscience as a superior authority to the publica doctrina? To respond to these questions we need to consider the nature of conscience.
Conscience
The reality of conscience as experienced by all human beings is the cross-cultural and trans-historical context into which the Apostolic proclamation of repentance and forgiveness in Christ Jesus is made. Although the Scriptures never give a definition of the term ‘conscience’, the writings of St Paul in particular give us a clear picture of the role of conscience, especially as it is informed by the Word of God, in leading us in the life of faith and love (e.g. Romans 2:14-16; 1 Timothy 4:2; 1 Corinthians 8:7-13). On the basis of the Scriptural witness, the Lutheran Confessions assume knowledge of the role of conscience in human life as being crucial in determining a right understanding of the distinction between the Law and the Gospel. In fact the Confessions go so far to say that without obedience to conscience, there can be no faith in Christ.[2]
What is Conscience?
Hallesby, whose writing on conscience is familiar to many Lutherans, defines conscience as ‘that knowledge or consciousness by which man knows that he is conforming to moral law or the will of God’ (Hallesby 8). In this definition Hallesby simply clarifies that, when it comes to determining a right or wrong course of action, conscience by its very nature must be informed by something other than itself. Conscience does not and cannot establish teaching or rules to which any human being is accountable to him or herself, or to others, or to God. Koehler[3] puts it this way: ‘Conscience never sets up a moral rule or code for its own guidance, it does not establish ethical principles for our conduct, it merely prompts us to observe what we believe to be right and to eschew what we believe to be wrong’ (Koehler 346-347). This understanding of conscience is not peculiar to Koehler or Hallesby or even the Lutheran church as a whole. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, explicating the tradition regarding conscience common to the universal church puts it this way: ‘Moral conscience, present at the heart of the person, enjoins him at the appropriate moment to do good and to avoid evil. It also judges particular choices, approving those that are good and denouncing those that are evil. It bears witness to the authority of truth in reference to the supreme Good to which the human person is drawn, and it welcomes the commandments…It is by the judgment of conscience that man perceives and recognizes the prescriptions of the divine law’ (CCC 1777, 1778). Again, in this definition, conscience receives rather than establishes knowledge of what is good and evil; it is by means of the conscience that human beings recognize and apply the precepts of God’s law, accessed either by reason through creation, or by faith through revelation.
In this traditional (and indeed Scriptural) understanding of conscience it should be noted that conscience is not simply reliant for its knowledge of good and evil on what is handed down in different human communities, whether Christian or other. Following the lead given by St Paul in Romans 2:15 (‘The Gentiles show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, to which their own conscience also bears witness’), the Confessions acknowledge the role of natural law in informing the conscience. The Apology (Ap. 4,7), the Large Catechism (LC II,67), and the Formula (FC SD VI, 5) all refer to the reality of natural law, known through reason, and received by the conscience (although received ‘to some extent’ (Ap. IV,7) because only divine revelation shows us the full meaning of the law). All human beings, by using their reason, can know the natural law at least to some extent, although different human traditions can darken this knowledge, while the Word of God confirms, clarifies, and deepens this knowledge as it is received by the conscience.
Why is Obeying Conscience Important?
It is on the basis of such an understanding of conscience that the significance of obedience to conscience is most clearly seen. Because conscience is the means by which we apply our knowledge of good and evil to the moral issues that we face, when we listen to conscience we are (whether we are Christians or not) actually putting ourselves before Christ Jesus, the judge of the living and the dead. Obeying conscience, of course, does not in itself justify us (1 Corinthians 4:4 ‘I am not aware of anything against myself [i.e. my conscience is clear], but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me’). But it is the way in which we come from darkness into light, and so receive the mercy of the One who is the light of the world (1 John 1:5-7; John 8:12; cf 1 John 3:19-20). We will deal with this in more detail below.
This teaching regarding obedience to conscience, on the other hand, also shows us that when we suppress the voice of conscience, or when we act contrary to the dictates of conscience, we are sinning not just against conscience but against God. Koehler puts it strongly: `To act against conscience is sin…It is a sin when we act contrary to the First and Second or any other Commandment, but it is just as much a sin when in any matter that involves a moral issue we act contrary to the dictates of our conscience’ (Koehler 356-357). This is why it is possible, in St Paul’s evaluation, for someone to defile their conscience and to fall even when their actions are not objectively opposed to God’s commands or prohibitions, as is the case with a person of weak conscience eating food sacrificed to idols (1 Corinthians 8). In fact in his teaching on this issue St Paul uses the categories of holiness to describe the impact of acting against conscience. To act against conscience is to defile it, and so to render the Christian holding such conscience incapable of participating with blessing in the holiness of God. An example of the consequences of participating in bad conscience in the holiness of God is spelled out in St Paul’s teaching on the Lord’s Supper in 1 Corinthians 11 (‘For this reason many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. [And note how he goes on:] But if we judged ourselves, we would not be judged’ –cf. 4:4).
An analogy may be helpful to clarify what has been said so far regarding conscience. A traveler might use a compass to get their bearings. But without a map displaying the traveler’s true location, the compass is of limited use and the traveler will be at no advantage in reaching their destination. Likewise in determining a course of action conscience on its own is of limited use. It needs true doctrine about right and wrong, it needs true teaching about the purpose of human existence. Now, our conscience, like a good compass, will always and infallibly orient us to what we have been taught is good, and will always point us away from what we have been taught is wrong[4]. But our conscience, like a good compass, cannot give us the location of our destination as human beings or knowledge of the right way to reach it. It is true that just as a traveler errs from the path if they disregard the promptings of their compass, so we err from the path of righteousness if we disobey the voice of conscience. But it is also true that just as obeying the promptings of a compass is no guarantee of a successful journey to someone with the wrong map, so obeying conscience is no guarantee of holy living for someone who has received false or heretical teaching.[5]
From this we may go on to say that if disobeying conscience in matters that have no divine command or prohibition leads to a defiled conscience, disobeying conscience in matters that do have a divine command or prohibition (if you like, disobeying the compass when it conforms to a true map) is potentially devastating to the life of faith. Again Koehler: ‘The situation is worse when a man acts contrary to convictions that are in full agreement with the Word of God. He knows that God does not want him to steal, his conscience also warns him not to do it, and yet he steals. In this case he commits a double sin, one against the Seventh Commandment, the other against his conscience. This is a very serious matter, this kills faith. For Paul tells us 1 Tim. 1:19: “Holding faith and a good conscience; which some having put away concerning faith have made shipwreck.” He means to say that he who puts away a good conscience by acting contrary to its demands makes a shipwreck concerning his faith, i.e., loses faith’ (Koehler 359). Conscience is given by God as the guide to lead us to Christ Jesus the Saviour – to lead us to our destiny as bodily participants in the divine life of the Trinity (Ephesians 1:20-23; 2 Peter 1:4). Therefore to abandon conscience is to abandon the means by which God opens us to the revelation of the His Word made flesh; it is, ultimately, to abandon Christ Jesus.
The Relation of Conscience to the Word of God
From this the orientation of conscience to the Word of God may become clearer. It is not that Christian conscience is different in itself from non-Christian conscience, or that the conscience of a Christian person is in itself an ultimate and infallible guide to holy living. Rather, Christian conscience, when it is informed by the Word of God, has a true knowledge of good and evil. The Word, through conscience, judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart with devastating clarity (Hebrews 4:12). In addition to this, conscience, when it is informed by God’s Word, leads Christians to know that they are not simply answerable to themselves or the human community, but that they are ‘naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom [they] must render an account’ (Hebrews 4:13 cf. Romans 2:6-11).
How do we get a Good Conscience?
If this were the sum total of the relationship between conscience and the Word of God, then Christian people would be forced into a situation of perpetual ‘bad conscience’ –of living only with the ever-accusing power of God’s Law. (Ap IV, 167) However God’s Word also reveals to us Christ Jesus the Saviour, the one who gives us the gift of God’s mercy and forgiveness; the one who renews our will and gives us the strength to live according to the perfect law of love. Moreover the Holy Spirit leads people through Word-of-God-informed conscience into fellowship not only with God the Father through the Lord Jesus, but also into fellowship with all the baptized as they partake as one in the holy things of God: the Scriptures; the Sacraments; and the bodily confession of saving faith (SA VIII,10).
In all this it may be said that godly conscience orients the believer to Christ Jesus, and so is the means by which we submit to the liberating power of God’s Word. When our conscience rightly accuses us on the basis of God’s Law, we hunger and thirst for a righteousness which is not ours but which can only be given to us –the righteousness of God given in Christ Jesus (Romans 1:17). Good conscience is therefore Christ-informed conscience that results from and leads a person to placing their whole trust in Christ Jesus as Saviour. In fact the Holy Spirit leads Christians to receive all the promises and commands of Christ as words which liberate human beings from the bonds of sin and death, and lead the believer and the whole Church into the new human life that sprang into being at the resurrection of Christ.
Where does this happen?
What has been said in this last section can sound a little abstract or theoretical. In the life of the church, however, the reality of God informing conscience through His Word, and so leading people to saving faith in Christ, happens in concrete, specific, and even bodily ways. Of course in life there are a myriad of particular situations in which Christian people are led by the Holy Spirit to obey the promptings of conscience; but a key Christ-instituted way (perhaps the key Christ-instituted way) in which we listen to conscience is within the context of confession and absolution.
The Small Catechism gives the most straightforward teaching concerning what Christ has given us in conferring on the church the authority to forgive sins. Put simply, Christ has given us the freedom to look at our lives according to reality – according to the Law of God - and to make our confession of sin because God is love and forgives us our sins for Christ’s sake. When Luther poses the question: What are the sins of which we have knowledge and that trouble us? He answers: ‘Reflect on your condition in light of the Ten Commandments’ (SC V, 20) - that is, in light of the Law of God, which is both inscribed on the human heart in creation, and handed on clearly in revelation. Luther goes on to encourage the believer to make a further confession, that is that the forgiveness they receive from the confessor comes from God (SC V, 27). In this the conscience, open to the Word of God as it is received in Law and Gospel, leads the believer to place their trust in Christ alone, and so to receive the power of the risen Christ to live the life of Christian love (Philippians 3:10).
The theology that is at the basis of the practice of Private Confession and Absolution is spelled out most clearly in Article XII of the Apology (Penitence): ‘The power of the keys administers and offers the Gospel through absolution, which is the true voice of the Gospel...Hearing the Gospel and hearing absolution strengthens and consoles the conscience’ (AC Ap. XII, 39-43). Here we have a Christ-centered understanding of the role of conscience in relation to the Word of God, that upholds God’s law and Gospel in their purity, and that gives the believer real access to the saving presence of Christ in the church.
Luther had sharp words to say to those who refused to use the gift of Christ (the Keys) that we receive in the form of Private Confession and Absolution: ‘[I]f you despise it and proudly stay away from confession, then we must come to the conclusion that you are no Christian and that you ought not receive the sacrament. For you despise what no Christian ought to despise, and you show thereby that you can have no forgiveness of sin. And this is a sure sign that you also despise the Gospel’ (LC Brief Exhortation, 29). The index to the Book of Concord gives copious references to the evangelical interpretation of Private Confession and Absolution given throughout the Confessional documents. Given the significance of Private Confession and Absolution in both the writings of Luther and the theology of the Confessions, it would at the least be curious if a Lutheran pastor were to refuse to use such a gift while at the same time dissenting from the publica doctrina of the church. I am personally persuaded that a deeper appropriation of our Scripture-based tradition of Private Confession and Absolution would be a very helpful precondition for any real critical engagement with the publica doctrina that would not offend against conscience, either of the one dissenting, or of those receiving the theological argumentation that might form the basis of dissent.
What does conscience have to do with the confession of faith?
The way in which conscience is dealt with in the confessions, and which is reflected in the treatment on conscience in this paper, can make it seem as if conscience exists primarily in aiding us somehow to escape God’s commands and prohibitions. This apparent conclusion is far from the mark. While it is true that Christ Jesus frees us from the condemnation that comes from failing to live according to God’s Law, it is just as true that Christ Jesus frees us to live according to God’s commands and prohibitions. When Christ, through His church, liberates us from the power of sin, He gives us the Holy Spirit, who frees us to live in a God-pleasing way. What might this look like?
Let’s say that a pastor sins by knowingly making a false confession of faith – by using his mouth to confess what his heart does not believe, and to confess what he knows does not conform to the Word of God. That pastor has ‘doubly sinned’ and will experience bad conscience. If his bad conscience does not find rest in Christ, that pastor will be vulnerable to spiritual attack from Satan and so may be drawn further into sin and even into false belief in his heart. Left uncared for, the pastor may even end up rejecting conscience with its burdensome accusations, and so ‘shipwreck’ his faith (1 Timothy 1:19). But let’s say that the pastor is encouraged by a brother to confess his sins and receive absolution. When he avails himself of the opportunity, he will receive the gift of good conscience in Christ Jesus. This will give him the strength to seek God’s approval rather than that of human beings, and it will give him the freedom to do what he could not do by his own strength – make a true confession of faith with heart and mouth. The absolution, in giving good conscience, thus also gives freedom and power to live according to God’s will.
Perhaps more than any other part of Scripture, 1 John brings out this connection between confession of sin, forgiveness in Christ Jesus, and the new ability to love and keep God’s commands. In fact the Apostle teaches that God’s children have boldness before God through belief in Christ Jesus (1 John 4:18-24), a boldness that gives them a new reception of God’s commandments: ‘For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith. Who is it that conquers the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?’ (1 John 5:3-5). The one who, when condemned in heart (that is, when experiencing bad conscience) places their trust in Christ Jesus the Saviour, receives God’s forgiveness, and is renewed by God to love all that He commands, and to do it by the power of the Holy Spirit.
If a right confession of faith were our own work – if by it we somehow established our status as sons of God - then we would always be defeated when assaulted by Satan. We would be forced back on to our own integrity or honesty or intellectual prowess or knowledge of history or theology; we would be forced to rely on ourselves and our own strength, and so would fall. The devil is more subtle in his temptations than we are sure in our convictions. But, thanks be to God, a right confession of faith is the work of the Holy Spirit, who gives us the very words by which we may rightly address God (Romans 8:15-17; 26-27), and who, in bringing us to Christ, teaches us that God is love.
The example of St Peter (Matthew 16:13-28) reminds us that the right confession of faith is never our own possession. At all times we face the temptation to turn away from the cross to human glory. I believe that it is no coincidence that Jesus gives St Peter the Keys between the Apostle’s Spirit-inspired confession and his Devil-inspired rejection of Christ and his ministry. God gives the church authority to forgive so that Christians may make the true confession of faith in a penitential posture. When we pastors confess our sin we hear in absolution the very word that brings us to the true confession of Jesus the Lord, and that frees us to receive all his commands with joy and thanks.
Dissent
The issue of dissent is not a theoretical one for the LCA. At this coming General Pastors’ Conference and national Convention, we are facing anew deliberation concerning the LCA’s publica doctrina on the ordination of women. This is an issue that is potentially one of deep dissent, and that may even lead to separation of congregations from the LCA. It is worth looking again at the careful way in which our church’s teaching is worded, to see how it makes an appeal to conscience on the basis of the Scriptures.
Though women prophets were used by the Spirit of God in the Old as well as in the New Testament 1 Cor. 14:34,35 and I Tim. 2:11-14 prohibit a woman from being called into the office of the public ministry for the proclamation of the Word and the administration of the Sacraments. This apostolic rule is binding on all Christendom; hereby her rights as a member of the spiritual priesthood are in no wise impaired. (TA VI 11)
In the LCA most of the debate on the ordination of women has centered on the two texts cited in this public teaching, either by dealing with them exegetically, or by attending to the hermeneutical principles used in arriving at different interpretations. It seems to me that three basic positions have developed in response to the debate, corresponding to three different groups of people.
There are those who believe in conscience that God’s Word prohibits women from being called into the office of the public ministry. These people are thus conscience bound to the current publica doctrina of the LCA on this issue, and a change in the publica doctrina would lead them into a situation of dissent.
There are those who are unsure whether God’s Word prohibits or allows the ordination of women, and so who do not experience being bound in conscience one way or the other. For the sake of unity and peace in the church (Ephesians 4:3) these people are content to live and teach according to the publica doctrina on the issue, either as it stands now or as it might be changed in the future.
Then there are those who believe in conscience that God’s Word allows and even mandates the ordination of women, and who see the refusal to ordain women as a denial of the Gospel. Without a change in the current publica doctrina of the LCA such people are conscience bound to head into a situation of dissent.
The first and last of these positions are mutually exclusive; the middle position, although the least threatening to unity in the LCA, is spiritually safe only for those who can maintain uncertainty in good conscience. Insofar as the publica doctrina on women’s ordination in time leads to unavoidable consequences in practice, our church appears to be at a crossroads. What are our options? The Theses of Agreement, in dealing with those principles governing church fellowship state:
We believe that where differences in teaching and practice exist or arise between Churches uniting, these differences are to be removed by willingly submitting to the authority of the Word of God. Where a difference in teaching or practice is a departure from the doctrine of the Bible, such difference cannot be tolerated, but must be pointed out as an error, on the basis of clear passages of Holy Writ; and if the error is persisted in, in spite of instruction, warning, and earnest witness, it must at last lead to a separation (TA 4a).
Our church is now, even here, in the process of examining the ‘doctrine of the Bible’. What the future holds for the LCA is not ours to see. But our own future as God’s baptized people is ours to see, and is set before us in the word of absolution. What God will make of us, what confession of faith in heart and mouth He will give us, will only become apparent in this world when we place ourselves on our knees before Christ Jesus, when we let His Word inform our conscience, when we speak what our conscience commands us to say, and when we hear in trust His forgiveness.
Conclusion
In this paper we have looked at conscience, dissent, and unity in the church. The majority of the paper has been a treatment on conscience, because conscience under God’s Word is the true forum in which issues of dissent and unity in the church are rightly understood. Obedience to conscience under God’s Word is the right and effective means to lasting unity in the LCA, and is the only way that dissent can be dealt with in a healing manner. The nature of the ongoing debate at pastors’ conference and general convention is dependent on the extent to which the participants are willing to obey their conscience under the Word of God. If the participants are unwilling to obey conscience as it receives God’s Word, then no outcome, however harmonious it may outwardly appear, will be for the lasting benefit of the church. If the participants are willing to obey conscience under the Word of God, then the outcome, no matter how conflict-ridden it may seem, will be for true unity in and of the church.
This paper has primarily been a call to repentance; specifically, it has been a call to us as pastors of this district to obey the voice of conscience and to receive anew the Word of God as it informs conscience. It has been a call for us pastors to take the lead in submitting to Christ’s gift of the Keys as we receive it in the form of Private Confession and Absolution. It has been an exhortation for us to trust that in this gift of Christ we will experience the power of his resurrection as we are freed by the Holy Spirit to make a true confession of faith in our hearts and with our mouths, in spirit and body, before God and the world. It is my hope that in this we will lead as true shepherds of the flock entrusted into our care, and so experience God-given unity as one flock under one shepherd.
St Matthias, 14th of May, 2006
Bendigo, Bethlehem Lutheran Church
[1]Prepared by the Commission on Theology and Inter-Church Relations. Recommended for adoption by the General Pastors Conference. Adopted by the General Synod. 1975 Convention. *Reviewed July 2001, unedited
[2] In the Formula of Concord it is put this way: ‘[W]e should not imagine a kind of faith in this connection [justification] that could coexist and co-persist with a wicked intention to sin and to act contrary to one’s conscience’ (FC Ep. III, 11).
[3] E W A Koehler (1875-1951), was a Missouri Synod pastor and theologian. He was awarded his DD from Concordia Seminary in 1941. For reference to his writing on conscience see the bibliography.
[4] Koehler: ‘saying that conscience is infallible does not mean that it will inevitably function in every instance in which man is about to do what he knows to be wrong. For if one persistently disregards, and willfully acts contrary to, the promptings of conscience, these become weaker and weaker until they finally cease. This is what paul means when he speaks of a “conscience seared with a hot iron” 1 Tim. 4:2’. (Koehler 351)
[5] The fact that we are called by God always to obey conscience is consonant with the fact that conscience can be badly informed and so lead people into acts which are objectively sinful: ‘Knowledge and convictions in moral matters differ greatly among men…But there is no difference in the function of conscience; it acts alike in all men. While, therefore, the knowledge, according to which conscience acts, may be in error, conscience itself never errs in its unique function of urging man to comply with what he believes to be right –Our opinions and convictions as to what is morally right change…But conscience never changes; it never approves what for the time being we know to be wrong, nor does it ever warn us against doing what we know to be right’ (Koehler 340)
Bibliography
The Book of Concord Theodore G Tappert (ed) Fortress Press Philadelphia 1959
Catechism of the Catholic Church (second Edition) St Pauls Strathfied, 2003
Hallesby, O Conscience IVP Leicester 1995
Koehler, E W A ‘Conscience’ Concordia Theological Monthly Vol XII, No 5 May 1942
All biblical quotations are from the NRSV
Conscience, Dissent, and Unity in the Church
Presented to the Victorian District Pastors’ Conference, May 2006, by Fraser Pearce, Pastor of Bethlehem Lutheran Church, Bendigo
Speaking in Good Conscience
In the Gospel according to St Matthew, we hear these words of the Lord: ‘I tell you, on the day of judgment you will have to give account for every careless word you utter; for by your words you will be justified, and by your words you will be condemned’ (Matthew 12:36-37). These words, spoken by the Lord, stand as a warning to us. We can be tempted in life to treat the words that we speak with a levity that does not take into account the judgment of God. When we fall into this temptation we speak words that we know, in our conscience, while being plausible and winsome to the people who hear us, do not have the approval of God. When we fall into this temptation we use our tongues to serve the god of human approval, rather than to bless the true God by speaking what is true.
Confessing the Faith in Good Conscience
Care in the use of words, and the role of conscience in discerning what we may say with the approval of God, is of particular significance when it comes to the confession of faith that we make before God and the world. When we confess our faith we are not speaking words lightly. Instead we are taking on our lips declarations of faith that are made, or at least should be made, soberly and with awareness of our accountability to God. The quotation from the psalms that forms the superscription to the Augsburg Confession sums up this attitude: ‘I will also speak of your decrees before kings, and shall not be put to shame’ (Psalm 119:46). That is: our public confession before the world does not bring us shame before God, because it is made of the basis of His Word and in good conscience.
Confessing the Faith and Salvation
Scripture brings out the good news of our accountability to God; St Paul in Romans teaches that God works His salvation in us by giving us both the belief in our hearts and the confession of our lips –by bringing together the spiritual belief and the bodily confession (Romans 10:9-10; c.f. 2 Corinthians 5:10; Romans 2:6-11). In fact we can say that when our outward actions conform to our inward beliefs in Christ Jesus, we have a foretaste of what the Apostles’ Creed means when it speaks of the ‘resurrection of the body’: our bodies are joined to the supernatural confession of faith, and so become bearers of God’s blessing to ourselves and the world (Matthew 16:13-20; 1 Corinthians 12:3; Luke 1:26-56). We are not only forgiven sinners, we are ‘a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people, in order that [we] may proclaim the mighty acts of him who called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light’ (1 Peter 2:9).
Bodily Confession of Spiritual Truth
In this paper I will be taking up the Scriptural teaching that what we do with our bodies has spiritual significance, and that we make our bodily confession of faith primarily in the presence of God. In other words I will be working with the understanding that what we speak in our bodies in the temporal world is in fact loaded with eschatological significance, and that this fact is the stimulus for the great joy that we can take in confessing the church’s faith.
In this paper I will also be dealing with the reality of dissent –with the fact that situations may arise in which we may not be able to confess the public teaching of our church in good conscience. We will see that from a Christian point of view dissent does not focus on how an individual asserts their rights, or on how they effect their independence from the power structure of the group. Rather we will see that it focuses on the rupture that is caused when the dissenter refuses to confess that teaching which is the basis for fellowship of pulpit and altar.
From this we will see how dissent from public teaching is linked with the unity of the church, and we will deal with the question of what to do when someone cannot in good conscience confess the unifying public teaching of their church. This is a particularly significant question for pastors, who are required to make public vows regarding their fidelity to the public teaching of the church, and who are held especially accountable by God for false teaching or corrupt practice (James 3:1). In our context one clear practical question becomes: Can a pastor who is in dissent from the publica doctrina of the LCA remain in fellowship with the LCA? But before that question is addressed, we need to examine the relationship of the individual believer to the church in the act of confessing the faith.
The Church’s Publica Doctrina
As pastors we are called by the church publicly to teach and confess not our own opinions or our own particular exegeses of biblical texts, but the publica doctrina of the church as it is confessed in the Book of Concord, and as it is explicated in the Theses of Agreement and Doctrinal Statements and Theological Opinions of the LCA. Not all the issues dealt with in the church’s publica doctrina are of equal weight, and, as we shall see below, in principle our doctrinal and theological statements and opinions are patient of reform on the basis of Scripture. But, until such a time as our doctrinal statements and theological opinions are changed by general pastors’ conference together with general convention, we are bound, at least in our capacity as pastors of the LCA, to teach and act in accordance with them. Practically speaking, although we may have questions concerning aspects of the publica doctrina, when it comes to what we proclaim from the pulpit or teach the congregations in our care we are bound in conscience and by our ordination and installation vows to submit our private judgments concerning the publica doctrina to the judgment of the church.
It is a hallmark of Lutheran theology that care is taken in formulating and defining the publica doctrina so as only to bind consciences on issues that have clear divine commands or prohibitions. It is true that when it comes to the ecumenical creeds and Confessions of our church, we are called to make a quia rather than quatenus confession. That is, we are called to commit ourselves before God and the world to the contents of the Book of Concord because they are true expositions of the Word of God. We bind ourselves in conscience to this confession of faith; that is, we submit in conscience to the teaching contained in these confessions, and rely on the doctrinal content of the confessions to set the boundaries for the proper conduct of our worship and life. On issues that are dealt with in the Theses of Agreement and the Doctrinal Statements and Theological Opinions of the Lutheran Church of Australia, however, there is possibility for reform. In our current context, when we are facing the possibility of change in the publica doctrina of the LCA, it is helpful to look again at the ‘Status on the Theses of Agreement and Other Doctrinal Statements’[1]:
I. In the exercise of their teaching function, whether dealing with a group or a congregation or with individuals, pastors of the LCA should not run counter to the letter and the spirit of the Theses of Agreement.
2. The Theses of Agreement, the fruit of prayerful labours extending over many years, have been adopted in all seriousness and in good faith by both the former UELCA and ELCA as a unifying document. They should be respected and treated accordingly. Should amendments become desirable in the course of time, such amendments would have to be submitted to the entire Church after thorough theological examination and discussion. Meanwhile, a deliberate disregard of the Theses in teaching and preaching would appear as evidence of bad faith, and would constitute a serious threat to the unity of the Church. There may, of course, be inadvertent disregard of the Theses due to ignorance of their content.
3. It is clearly the right and the duty of the Church, in the face of current challenges, to define how it understands the Scriptures and the Confessions. Therefore, explanations and amendments of the Theses, as well as any other statements of a doctrinal nature, submitted to the entire Church after thorough theological examination and discussion and adopted by it, must be accorded the same authority in the Church as the Theses themselves (see l and 2 above).
The process of debate in the church regarding women’s ordination over the past decade and more, including prolonged discussions at pastors conferences and synods, have been ways the LCA has attempted to live according to its own teaching. This debate has been, as we well know, the cause of much heartache for many of our members, and much confusion on the part of pastors and the laity. Many people have spent time agonizing over how they can reconcile their consciences to the publica doctrina as it does exist, or as it might exist in the future.
Conscience and Publica Doctrina
One temptation that we face when we experience difficulties in accepting the publica doctrina is to pit conscience against the publica doctrina of the church, and to assert that the claims of conscience are superior to the confession that we pastors are called to make. In this model the voice of conscience and the publica doctrina are seen as competing authorities, with conscience being the final court of appeal. At first glance this model seems not simply to be attractive when we face difficulties with the publica doctrina, but to be an accurate reflection of reality. After all, it is true that God calls us always to obey conscience, and that to go against conscience is in all cases to risk spiritual harm (more on this below). It is also true that the content of the church’s publica doctrina is patient of reform, and that at times fidelity to the Word of God may mean agitating for change in the publica doctrina. Then why is this model unhelpful? Why is it misleading to see conscience as a superior authority to the publica doctrina? To respond to these questions we need to consider the nature of conscience.
Conscience
The reality of conscience as experienced by all human beings is the cross-cultural and trans-historical context into which the Apostolic proclamation of repentance and forgiveness in Christ Jesus is made. Although the Scriptures never give a definition of the term ‘conscience’, the writings of St Paul in particular give us a clear picture of the role of conscience, especially as it is informed by the Word of God, in leading us in the life of faith and love (e.g. Romans 2:14-16; 1 Timothy 4:2; 1 Corinthians 8:7-13). On the basis of the Scriptural witness, the Lutheran Confessions assume knowledge of the role of conscience in human life as being crucial in determining a right understanding of the distinction between the Law and the Gospel. In fact the Confessions go so far to say that without obedience to conscience, there can be no faith in Christ.[2]
What is Conscience?
Hallesby, whose writing on conscience is familiar to many Lutherans, defines conscience as ‘that knowledge or consciousness by which man knows that he is conforming to moral law or the will of God’ (Hallesby 8). In this definition Hallesby simply clarifies that, when it comes to determining a right or wrong course of action, conscience by its very nature must be informed by something other than itself. Conscience does not and cannot establish teaching or rules to which any human being is accountable to him or herself, or to others, or to God. Koehler[3] puts it this way: ‘Conscience never sets up a moral rule or code for its own guidance, it does not establish ethical principles for our conduct, it merely prompts us to observe what we believe to be right and to eschew what we believe to be wrong’ (Koehler 346-347). This understanding of conscience is not peculiar to Koehler or Hallesby or even the Lutheran church as a whole. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, explicating the tradition regarding conscience common to the universal church puts it this way: ‘Moral conscience, present at the heart of the person, enjoins him at the appropriate moment to do good and to avoid evil. It also judges particular choices, approving those that are good and denouncing those that are evil. It bears witness to the authority of truth in reference to the supreme Good to which the human person is drawn, and it welcomes the commandments…It is by the judgment of conscience that man perceives and recognizes the prescriptions of the divine law’ (CCC 1777, 1778). Again, in this definition, conscience receives rather than establishes knowledge of what is good and evil; it is by means of the conscience that human beings recognize and apply the precepts of God’s law, accessed either by reason through creation, or by faith through revelation.
In this traditional (and indeed Scriptural) understanding of conscience it should be noted that conscience is not simply reliant for its knowledge of good and evil on what is handed down in different human communities, whether Christian or other. Following the lead given by St Paul in Romans 2:15 (‘The Gentiles show that what the law requires is written on their hearts, to which their own conscience also bears witness’), the Confessions acknowledge the role of natural law in informing the conscience. The Apology (Ap. 4,7), the Large Catechism (LC II,67), and the Formula (FC SD VI, 5) all refer to the reality of natural law, known through reason, and received by the conscience (although received ‘to some extent’ (Ap. IV,7) because only divine revelation shows us the full meaning of the law). All human beings, by using their reason, can know the natural law at least to some extent, although different human traditions can darken this knowledge, while the Word of God confirms, clarifies, and deepens this knowledge as it is received by the conscience.
Why is Obeying Conscience Important?
It is on the basis of such an understanding of conscience that the significance of obedience to conscience is most clearly seen. Because conscience is the means by which we apply our knowledge of good and evil to the moral issues that we face, when we listen to conscience we are (whether we are Christians or not) actually putting ourselves before Christ Jesus, the judge of the living and the dead. Obeying conscience, of course, does not in itself justify us (1 Corinthians 4:4 ‘I am not aware of anything against myself [i.e. my conscience is clear], but I am not thereby acquitted. It is the Lord who judges me’). But it is the way in which we come from darkness into light, and so receive the mercy of the One who is the light of the world (1 John 1:5-7; John 8:12; cf 1 John 3:19-20). We will deal with this in more detail below.
This teaching regarding obedience to conscience, on the other hand, also shows us that when we suppress the voice of conscience, or when we act contrary to the dictates of conscience, we are sinning not just against conscience but against God. Koehler puts it strongly: `To act against conscience is sin…It is a sin when we act contrary to the First and Second or any other Commandment, but it is just as much a sin when in any matter that involves a moral issue we act contrary to the dictates of our conscience’ (Koehler 356-357). This is why it is possible, in St Paul’s evaluation, for someone to defile their conscience and to fall even when their actions are not objectively opposed to God’s commands or prohibitions, as is the case with a person of weak conscience eating food sacrificed to idols (1 Corinthians 8). In fact in his teaching on this issue St Paul uses the categories of holiness to describe the impact of acting against conscience. To act against conscience is to defile it, and so to render the Christian holding such conscience incapable of participating with blessing in the holiness of God. An example of the consequences of participating in bad conscience in the holiness of God is spelled out in St Paul’s teaching on the Lord’s Supper in 1 Corinthians 11 (‘For this reason many of you are weak and ill, and some have died. [And note how he goes on:] But if we judged ourselves, we would not be judged’ –cf. 4:4).
An analogy may be helpful to clarify what has been said so far regarding conscience. A traveler might use a compass to get their bearings. But without a map displaying the traveler’s true location, the compass is of limited use and the traveler will be at no advantage in reaching their destination. Likewise in determining a course of action conscience on its own is of limited use. It needs true doctrine about right and wrong, it needs true teaching about the purpose of human existence. Now, our conscience, like a good compass, will always and infallibly orient us to what we have been taught is good, and will always point us away from what we have been taught is wrong[4]. But our conscience, like a good compass, cannot give us the location of our destination as human beings or knowledge of the right way to reach it. It is true that just as a traveler errs from the path if they disregard the promptings of their compass, so we err from the path of righteousness if we disobey the voice of conscience. But it is also true that just as obeying the promptings of a compass is no guarantee of a successful journey to someone with the wrong map, so obeying conscience is no guarantee of holy living for someone who has received false or heretical teaching.[5]
From this we may go on to say that if disobeying conscience in matters that have no divine command or prohibition leads to a defiled conscience, disobeying conscience in matters that do have a divine command or prohibition (if you like, disobeying the compass when it conforms to a true map) is potentially devastating to the life of faith. Again Koehler: ‘The situation is worse when a man acts contrary to convictions that are in full agreement with the Word of God. He knows that God does not want him to steal, his conscience also warns him not to do it, and yet he steals. In this case he commits a double sin, one against the Seventh Commandment, the other against his conscience. This is a very serious matter, this kills faith. For Paul tells us 1 Tim. 1:19: “Holding faith and a good conscience; which some having put away concerning faith have made shipwreck.” He means to say that he who puts away a good conscience by acting contrary to its demands makes a shipwreck concerning his faith, i.e., loses faith’ (Koehler 359). Conscience is given by God as the guide to lead us to Christ Jesus the Saviour – to lead us to our destiny as bodily participants in the divine life of the Trinity (Ephesians 1:20-23; 2 Peter 1:4). Therefore to abandon conscience is to abandon the means by which God opens us to the revelation of the His Word made flesh; it is, ultimately, to abandon Christ Jesus.
The Relation of Conscience to the Word of God
From this the orientation of conscience to the Word of God may become clearer. It is not that Christian conscience is different in itself from non-Christian conscience, or that the conscience of a Christian person is in itself an ultimate and infallible guide to holy living. Rather, Christian conscience, when it is informed by the Word of God, has a true knowledge of good and evil. The Word, through conscience, judges the thoughts and intentions of the heart with devastating clarity (Hebrews 4:12). In addition to this, conscience, when it is informed by God’s Word, leads Christians to know that they are not simply answerable to themselves or the human community, but that they are ‘naked and laid bare to the eyes of the one to whom [they] must render an account’ (Hebrews 4:13 cf. Romans 2:6-11).
How do we get a Good Conscience?
If this were the sum total of the relationship between conscience and the Word of God, then Christian people would be forced into a situation of perpetual ‘bad conscience’ –of living only with the ever-accusing power of God’s Law. (Ap IV, 167) However God’s Word also reveals to us Christ Jesus the Saviour, the one who gives us the gift of God’s mercy and forgiveness; the one who renews our will and gives us the strength to live according to the perfect law of love. Moreover the Holy Spirit leads people through Word-of-God-informed conscience into fellowship not only with God the Father through the Lord Jesus, but also into fellowship with all the baptized as they partake as one in the holy things of God: the Scriptures; the Sacraments; and the bodily confession of saving faith (SA VIII,10).
In all this it may be said that godly conscience orients the believer to Christ Jesus, and so is the means by which we submit to the liberating power of God’s Word. When our conscience rightly accuses us on the basis of God’s Law, we hunger and thirst for a righteousness which is not ours but which can only be given to us –the righteousness of God given in Christ Jesus (Romans 1:17). Good conscience is therefore Christ-informed conscience that results from and leads a person to placing their whole trust in Christ Jesus as Saviour. In fact the Holy Spirit leads Christians to receive all the promises and commands of Christ as words which liberate human beings from the bonds of sin and death, and lead the believer and the whole Church into the new human life that sprang into being at the resurrection of Christ.
Where does this happen?
What has been said in this last section can sound a little abstract or theoretical. In the life of the church, however, the reality of God informing conscience through His Word, and so leading people to saving faith in Christ, happens in concrete, specific, and even bodily ways. Of course in life there are a myriad of particular situations in which Christian people are led by the Holy Spirit to obey the promptings of conscience; but a key Christ-instituted way (perhaps the key Christ-instituted way) in which we listen to conscience is within the context of confession and absolution.
The Small Catechism gives the most straightforward teaching concerning what Christ has given us in conferring on the church the authority to forgive sins. Put simply, Christ has given us the freedom to look at our lives according to reality – according to the Law of God - and to make our confession of sin because God is love and forgives us our sins for Christ’s sake. When Luther poses the question: What are the sins of which we have knowledge and that trouble us? He answers: ‘Reflect on your condition in light of the Ten Commandments’ (SC V, 20) - that is, in light of the Law of God, which is both inscribed on the human heart in creation, and handed on clearly in revelation. Luther goes on to encourage the believer to make a further confession, that is that the forgiveness they receive from the confessor comes from God (SC V, 27). In this the conscience, open to the Word of God as it is received in Law and Gospel, leads the believer to place their trust in Christ alone, and so to receive the power of the risen Christ to live the life of Christian love (Philippians 3:10).
The theology that is at the basis of the practice of Private Confession and Absolution is spelled out most clearly in Article XII of the Apology (Penitence): ‘The power of the keys administers and offers the Gospel through absolution, which is the true voice of the Gospel...Hearing the Gospel and hearing absolution strengthens and consoles the conscience’ (AC Ap. XII, 39-43). Here we have a Christ-centered understanding of the role of conscience in relation to the Word of God, that upholds God’s law and Gospel in their purity, and that gives the believer real access to the saving presence of Christ in the church.
Luther had sharp words to say to those who refused to use the gift of Christ (the Keys) that we receive in the form of Private Confession and Absolution: ‘[I]f you despise it and proudly stay away from confession, then we must come to the conclusion that you are no Christian and that you ought not receive the sacrament. For you despise what no Christian ought to despise, and you show thereby that you can have no forgiveness of sin. And this is a sure sign that you also despise the Gospel’ (LC Brief Exhortation, 29). The index to the Book of Concord gives copious references to the evangelical interpretation of Private Confession and Absolution given throughout the Confessional documents. Given the significance of Private Confession and Absolution in both the writings of Luther and the theology of the Confessions, it would at the least be curious if a Lutheran pastor were to refuse to use such a gift while at the same time dissenting from the publica doctrina of the church. I am personally persuaded that a deeper appropriation of our Scripture-based tradition of Private Confession and Absolution would be a very helpful precondition for any real critical engagement with the publica doctrina that would not offend against conscience, either of the one dissenting, or of those receiving the theological argumentation that might form the basis of dissent.
What does conscience have to do with the confession of faith?
The way in which conscience is dealt with in the confessions, and which is reflected in the treatment on conscience in this paper, can make it seem as if conscience exists primarily in aiding us somehow to escape God’s commands and prohibitions. This apparent conclusion is far from the mark. While it is true that Christ Jesus frees us from the condemnation that comes from failing to live according to God’s Law, it is just as true that Christ Jesus frees us to live according to God’s commands and prohibitions. When Christ, through His church, liberates us from the power of sin, He gives us the Holy Spirit, who frees us to live in a God-pleasing way. What might this look like?
Let’s say that a pastor sins by knowingly making a false confession of faith – by using his mouth to confess what his heart does not believe, and to confess what he knows does not conform to the Word of God. That pastor has ‘doubly sinned’ and will experience bad conscience. If his bad conscience does not find rest in Christ, that pastor will be vulnerable to spiritual attack from Satan and so may be drawn further into sin and even into false belief in his heart. Left uncared for, the pastor may even end up rejecting conscience with its burdensome accusations, and so ‘shipwreck’ his faith (1 Timothy 1:19). But let’s say that the pastor is encouraged by a brother to confess his sins and receive absolution. When he avails himself of the opportunity, he will receive the gift of good conscience in Christ Jesus. This will give him the strength to seek God’s approval rather than that of human beings, and it will give him the freedom to do what he could not do by his own strength – make a true confession of faith with heart and mouth. The absolution, in giving good conscience, thus also gives freedom and power to live according to God’s will.
Perhaps more than any other part of Scripture, 1 John brings out this connection between confession of sin, forgiveness in Christ Jesus, and the new ability to love and keep God’s commands. In fact the Apostle teaches that God’s children have boldness before God through belief in Christ Jesus (1 John 4:18-24), a boldness that gives them a new reception of God’s commandments: ‘For the love of God is this, that we obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome, for whatever is born of God conquers the world. And this is the victory that conquers the world, our faith. Who is it that conquers the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?’ (1 John 5:3-5). The one who, when condemned in heart (that is, when experiencing bad conscience) places their trust in Christ Jesus the Saviour, receives God’s forgiveness, and is renewed by God to love all that He commands, and to do it by the power of the Holy Spirit.
If a right confession of faith were our own work – if by it we somehow established our status as sons of God - then we would always be defeated when assaulted by Satan. We would be forced back on to our own integrity or honesty or intellectual prowess or knowledge of history or theology; we would be forced to rely on ourselves and our own strength, and so would fall. The devil is more subtle in his temptations than we are sure in our convictions. But, thanks be to God, a right confession of faith is the work of the Holy Spirit, who gives us the very words by which we may rightly address God (Romans 8:15-17; 26-27), and who, in bringing us to Christ, teaches us that God is love.
The example of St Peter (Matthew 16:13-28) reminds us that the right confession of faith is never our own possession. At all times we face the temptation to turn away from the cross to human glory. I believe that it is no coincidence that Jesus gives St Peter the Keys between the Apostle’s Spirit-inspired confession and his Devil-inspired rejection of Christ and his ministry. God gives the church authority to forgive so that Christians may make the true confession of faith in a penitential posture. When we pastors confess our sin we hear in absolution the very word that brings us to the true confession of Jesus the Lord, and that frees us to receive all his commands with joy and thanks.
Dissent
The issue of dissent is not a theoretical one for the LCA. At this coming General Pastors’ Conference and national Convention, we are facing anew deliberation concerning the LCA’s publica doctrina on the ordination of women. This is an issue that is potentially one of deep dissent, and that may even lead to separation of congregations from the LCA. It is worth looking again at the careful way in which our church’s teaching is worded, to see how it makes an appeal to conscience on the basis of the Scriptures.
Though women prophets were used by the Spirit of God in the Old as well as in the New Testament 1 Cor. 14:34,35 and I Tim. 2:11-14 prohibit a woman from being called into the office of the public ministry for the proclamation of the Word and the administration of the Sacraments. This apostolic rule is binding on all Christendom; hereby her rights as a member of the spiritual priesthood are in no wise impaired. (TA VI 11)
In the LCA most of the debate on the ordination of women has centered on the two texts cited in this public teaching, either by dealing with them exegetically, or by attending to the hermeneutical principles used in arriving at different interpretations. It seems to me that three basic positions have developed in response to the debate, corresponding to three different groups of people.
There are those who believe in conscience that God’s Word prohibits women from being called into the office of the public ministry. These people are thus conscience bound to the current publica doctrina of the LCA on this issue, and a change in the publica doctrina would lead them into a situation of dissent.
There are those who are unsure whether God’s Word prohibits or allows the ordination of women, and so who do not experience being bound in conscience one way or the other. For the sake of unity and peace in the church (Ephesians 4:3) these people are content to live and teach according to the publica doctrina on the issue, either as it stands now or as it might be changed in the future.
Then there are those who believe in conscience that God’s Word allows and even mandates the ordination of women, and who see the refusal to ordain women as a denial of the Gospel. Without a change in the current publica doctrina of the LCA such people are conscience bound to head into a situation of dissent.
The first and last of these positions are mutually exclusive; the middle position, although the least threatening to unity in the LCA, is spiritually safe only for those who can maintain uncertainty in good conscience. Insofar as the publica doctrina on women’s ordination in time leads to unavoidable consequences in practice, our church appears to be at a crossroads. What are our options? The Theses of Agreement, in dealing with those principles governing church fellowship state:
We believe that where differences in teaching and practice exist or arise between Churches uniting, these differences are to be removed by willingly submitting to the authority of the Word of God. Where a difference in teaching or practice is a departure from the doctrine of the Bible, such difference cannot be tolerated, but must be pointed out as an error, on the basis of clear passages of Holy Writ; and if the error is persisted in, in spite of instruction, warning, and earnest witness, it must at last lead to a separation (TA 4a).
Our church is now, even here, in the process of examining the ‘doctrine of the Bible’. What the future holds for the LCA is not ours to see. But our own future as God’s baptized people is ours to see, and is set before us in the word of absolution. What God will make of us, what confession of faith in heart and mouth He will give us, will only become apparent in this world when we place ourselves on our knees before Christ Jesus, when we let His Word inform our conscience, when we speak what our conscience commands us to say, and when we hear in trust His forgiveness.
Conclusion
In this paper we have looked at conscience, dissent, and unity in the church. The majority of the paper has been a treatment on conscience, because conscience under God’s Word is the true forum in which issues of dissent and unity in the church are rightly understood. Obedience to conscience under God’s Word is the right and effective means to lasting unity in the LCA, and is the only way that dissent can be dealt with in a healing manner. The nature of the ongoing debate at pastors’ conference and general convention is dependent on the extent to which the participants are willing to obey their conscience under the Word of God. If the participants are unwilling to obey conscience as it receives God’s Word, then no outcome, however harmonious it may outwardly appear, will be for the lasting benefit of the church. If the participants are willing to obey conscience under the Word of God, then the outcome, no matter how conflict-ridden it may seem, will be for true unity in and of the church.
This paper has primarily been a call to repentance; specifically, it has been a call to us as pastors of this district to obey the voice of conscience and to receive anew the Word of God as it informs conscience. It has been a call for us pastors to take the lead in submitting to Christ’s gift of the Keys as we receive it in the form of Private Confession and Absolution. It has been an exhortation for us to trust that in this gift of Christ we will experience the power of his resurrection as we are freed by the Holy Spirit to make a true confession of faith in our hearts and with our mouths, in spirit and body, before God and the world. It is my hope that in this we will lead as true shepherds of the flock entrusted into our care, and so experience God-given unity as one flock under one shepherd.
St Matthias, 14th of May, 2006
Bendigo, Bethlehem Lutheran Church
[1]Prepared by the Commission on Theology and Inter-Church Relations. Recommended for adoption by the General Pastors Conference. Adopted by the General Synod. 1975 Convention. *Reviewed July 2001, unedited
[2] In the Formula of Concord it is put this way: ‘[W]e should not imagine a kind of faith in this connection [justification] that could coexist and co-persist with a wicked intention to sin and to act contrary to one’s conscience’ (FC Ep. III, 11).
[3] E W A Koehler (1875-1951), was a Missouri Synod pastor and theologian. He was awarded his DD from Concordia Seminary in 1941. For reference to his writing on conscience see the bibliography.
[4] Koehler: ‘saying that conscience is infallible does not mean that it will inevitably function in every instance in which man is about to do what he knows to be wrong. For if one persistently disregards, and willfully acts contrary to, the promptings of conscience, these become weaker and weaker until they finally cease. This is what paul means when he speaks of a “conscience seared with a hot iron” 1 Tim. 4:2’. (Koehler 351)
[5] The fact that we are called by God always to obey conscience is consonant with the fact that conscience can be badly informed and so lead people into acts which are objectively sinful: ‘Knowledge and convictions in moral matters differ greatly among men…But there is no difference in the function of conscience; it acts alike in all men. While, therefore, the knowledge, according to which conscience acts, may be in error, conscience itself never errs in its unique function of urging man to comply with what he believes to be right –Our opinions and convictions as to what is morally right change…But conscience never changes; it never approves what for the time being we know to be wrong, nor does it ever warn us against doing what we know to be right’ (Koehler 340)
Bibliography
The Book of Concord Theodore G Tappert (ed) Fortress Press Philadelphia 1959
Catechism of the Catholic Church (second Edition) St Pauls Strathfied, 2003
Hallesby, O Conscience IVP Leicester 1995
Koehler, E W A ‘Conscience’ Concordia Theological Monthly Vol XII, No 5 May 1942
All biblical quotations are from the NRSV
Saturday, September 16, 2006
The Smiling Girl
Back on the 15th of July our dear friends Tom and Chelsea got married. One day, when I get the hang of how this site works, I'll link their blogs.
Anyhow, Tom and Chelsea asked our first daughter (and Tom's Goddaughter) Francesca (known as Cho Cho) to be one of their attendants. Was she happy about it? Well, this photo was taken on the day.
It captures the spirit of the Cho.
Friday, September 15, 2006
Note: That thing is the umbilical cord
This is a picture of our darling little daughter. She will be baptised on the 24th of September. We'll be announcing her name as part of the baptism. Please join us in giving thanks to God for this little one!
One small step for man, one great leap for obscure men
epistolae obscurorum virorum: letters of obscure men
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