Methodists on the Eucharistic Spectrum

Rev. Dr. Todd A. Stepp has a nice piece at his blog considering a few of the major theological approaches to the sacrament of Holy Communion (Roman Catholic, Lutheran, Zwinglian, Calvinist, etc.) and exploring how the Wesleyan understanding is similar to and distinct from that of other churches. There follows some good discussion in the comments, so his post is worth the read.

There are now numerous sources for specifically Wesleyan/Methodist theological teaching and reflection on the sacrament of the Lord's Table. The 2004 (United Methodist) General Conference adopted "This Holy Mystery" as what we might call "official theological guidance and clarification" to help the church recover a more classical and Weslayan theology of the Lord's Supper. Of course, our foundational doctrinal statements on Holy Communion are to be found in the Articles of Religion (sec. 16, 18, & 19) and the Confession of Faith (sec. 6) in the Book of Discipline, and the Eucharistic hymns of the Wesleys form an important part of our theological tradition illuminating the mystery of the Lord's Supper.

This is an exciting time to be a part of the Methodist communion as our churches are, albiet very slowly, beginning to recover some of the sacramental theology and practice of the Wesleys. May God help us open all the deep riches of our Biblical faith to many more in the coming years.

To collar or not to collar?

Every now and again among Methodist bloggers there develop some good discussions or commentary about whether or not to wear a clerical collar, which is optional for all United Methodist clergy (as an Anglican priest John Wesley, as pictured below, always wore the 18th Century version of the collar).

I've been in an ecumenical ministry for the last four years in which I did a good deal of preaching and service-leading in Episcopal and Presbyterian (and even some Methodist) congregations that were accustomed to or familiar with a collar, and I certainly wore one on these occasions, though not generally on a typical day.

As I transition into a regular parish ministry this summer, my plan is to wear the collar each Sunday and perhaps whenever I know I'll be making hospital calls, though not on a daily basis. As I've said before I do think there are good reasons to use things like a collar, or vestments, and other visual connections with our historical 'rootedness' and 'catholicity' as United Methodists (even in services with "contemporary" music - the two are not at odds).

In a recent piece at his Closet Anglican blog, United Methodist pastor Tim Powers discussed his reasons for wearing the collar. He raises some good points, and also addresses some concerns that pastors may have when considering the collar. One thing that he says that really stuck with me was this:

So many people wear cowboy/girl clothes or all black or tattoos and pierce themselves in an attempt to "wear their stories." I would much rather wear God's story.

A pastor once told me he didn't wear a collar because "people look at you differently if you do" - but, I suppose that is the point: I like seeing clergy around town wearing collars because is that it is visible reminder to everyone (including the clergy themselves) that something weird is going on: there really are people - quite a few - whose lives have been radically grasped by the true and living God. And that is a story they wear, becoming almost "icon-like" as they go through their days.

Bishop: Our Society imperiled without Biblical faith

The Bishop of London has warned that fundamental concepts vital to British society [and other Western Societies] will be unsustainable without a Christian underpinning.

The Rt Revd Richard Chartres said Britain’s culture and civilisation were founded on the Bible, and expressed concern at any undermining of that foundation.

Rt Revd Chartres, who gave the sermon at last month’s Royal Wedding, was speaking at a symposium in the House of Lords on the Bible.

He said: “The economy and politics must have ground beneath them. In Britain that ground has been biblical since our earliest days – and you do not sacrifice that without sacrificing much of what has been built upon that ground.”

The Bishop also commented that concepts such at dignity and tolerance would be “very difficult to sustain without a Christian ground”.

Read it all here.

It is clear, if we are willing to look, that in some societies there simply is not the same reverence for concepts such as human dignity and tolerance as we in the Western nations (those with an undeniable Christian intellectual heritage) take for granted. Precisely because we take them for granted, we do not see the connection between fundamental Christian beliefs about the world and the origin of concepts such as human rights or respect for human dignity, for example (the logic of the US Declaration of Independence illustrates this wonderfully). It was precisely out of cultures inundated by the Christian faith - and the Biblical belief that humans bear the image of God - that these ideas of human dignity arose to begin with.

The Western (particularly European) societies run the risk of cutting off the branch upon which they sit by marginalizing the theistic (particularly Christian) principles upon which so many of our cherished political assumptions are founded. If we reject the foundations of these ideas, we may find our societies unable to provide a satisfactory answer the simple question "Why should we respect the fundamental human dignity of others?" (Especially if we are stronger than they and fear no reprisals).

I suspect that we need only look to the human rights record of atheistic communism to see what at least can ultimately happen when the voice of Abraham's God is forcibly ejected from the political arena.

For more upon these lines check this post.

An 'Eagle and Child' at LSU

The 'Eagle and Child' pub in Oxford (England) is the much celebrated meeting place of the 'Inklings,' the informal literary and philosophy discussion group that included such luminaries as C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Charles Williams, Owen Barfield, and others. While the group did meet in a couple of other pubs around Oxford, the 'Eagle and Child' is most associated with the group.

(I took the picture on the right on a pilgrimage to sites in Oxford relating to C.S. Lewis, the Wesley brothers/early Methodism, and Archbishop Thomas Cranmer).

Half a world away in Baton Rouge, that great American college town, we find "Lunch with C.S. Lewis" drawing crowds of hungry Louisiana State University students at St. Alban's Chapel (a ministry I frequented in my own college days, and the chapel wherein my beautiful wife and I were wed). Check the article at The Living Church. The local paper's take is here.

Crowds gathering to discuss Lewis isn't all that surprising perhaps, given his popularity. But we also see that there is, at least for some people, a true hunger for Christian teaching that is a bit more intellectually rigorous than what most sermons and Bible studies offer, while remaining more theologically orthodox than some other academic theological resources.

How do you think our churches can do a better job of inviting people to think more deeply about the faith than they might otherwise do? I've noticed churches in several cities sponsoring "Theology on Tap" discussion groups (or even lectures) in local pubs - is anything like that happening in your area?

How "not" to attact young people

The highly ironic post below is reprinted from the Non Sermoni Res blog. It may help you to know that the article is describing exactly what Trinity (Anglican/Episcopal) School for Ministry has been doing, a school which has been far more successful in attracting young adults than the average Episcopal or "mainline" seminary (or church).

Reflecting on my own church connection, I think it worth noting that Duke Divinity School which has the reputation of being our most "traditionalist/orthodox" seminary also has a younger student population than any other official United Methodist seminary (though I would imagine that the "unofficial" Asbury is pretty young as well).

United Methodist theologian Thomas Oden, in his various works has written of a "rebirth of orthodoxy" in which post-modern people would return to more classic forms of Christian belief and spirituality. Trinity School for ministry seems another place in which this is actually happening.

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How NOT to attract young people:

1. Build a seminary in a rundown former steel town outside Pittsburgh. This will discourage the hip and trendy.

2. Design a curriculum that is centered around biblical theology and creedal orthodoxy. This will discourage the progressive and relevant.

3. Require every faculty member and incoming seminarian to sign a doctrinal statement affirming the essentials of creedal orthodoxy. Make sure the statement is detailed enough that it is impossible to fudge. This will discourage the open-minded.

4. Require every incoming seminarian to learn the basics of biblical Hebrew and Greek their very first semester. This will discourage those who hate hard work.

5. Besides requiring courses that teach the Bible in English, require every seminarian to take at least one advanced exegesis course on either an Old Testament or New Testament book in the original Hebrew or Greek. This will discourage those who have more important things to do with their time.

6. Require that all students take courses in the basics of systematic theology and church history where they actually read people like Athanasius, Augustine, Luther, Calvin, and Barth rather than just reading about them. This will discourage those who would not rather read “dead white men.”

7. Require that all students take a course in Anglican theology where they actually have to read people like Thomas Cranmer, John Jewel, Richard Hooker, the Caroline Divines, Joseph Butler, John and Charles Wesley, Charles Simeon, the Oxford Movement, and modern Anglicans, rather than just reading about them. More “dead white men.”

8. Require that students take mandatory courses in missions and evangelism, and that every student take a mandatory mission trip outside the United States. (One is right now spending her Thanksgiving holiday not eating turkey, but in Turkey.) This will discourage everyone.

9. Require that students attend chapel (Morning or Evening Prayer) on those days that they are on campus, and attend Eucharist at the weekly campus service. This will discourage the easily bored.

10. Require that students lead Morning and Evening Prayer and preach in chapel. This will discourage those who would rather sleep in.

11. Require that students attend weekly advisee groups where students meet with and pray with fellow students and faculty. This will discourage those who would prefer to avoid all that intimacy—like yours truly.

12. Require that students contribute mandatory work hours doing things like helping out in the kitchen. This will discourage those who already have enough work to do.

13. Require that students take a course in Mentored Ministry where they learn how to pastor by working under the supervision of a local priest or pastor. This will discourage those who already know what the church needs.

14. Require that every few years the entire seminary (faculty and students) attend a major mission conference where people are encouraged to think about becoming overseas missionaries, and some end up doing so. This will discourage those who have no desire to go to dirty poor far away places where people don’t speak American English.

15. Regularly admit students from overseas so that students daily interact with other students from places like Uganda, Nigeria, the Sudan, Egypt, Indonesia, and Brazil. This will discourage those who think that life begins and ends at the border.

16. Hire a Dean/President who has pictures of Luther, Calvin, and Barth on his office wall. This will discourage Anglo-Catholics.

17. Hire other faculty who have icons on their walls. This will discourage Evangelicals.

18. Hire at least one faculty member who decorates his office with African art that he has picked up on his regular teaching trips to Africa. This will discourage those who are afraid he might suggest they take a trip to Africa.

19. Make sure that the local bishop (who serves on the Board) is deposed from his ministry by the Presiding Bishop of TEC, and he then goes on to become the Archbishop of a new Anglican church. This is guaranteed to offend a lot of people.

20. Have other board members who are Communion Partner bishops, including one whose diocese is currently being threatened by TEC, and have other board members and regular guests who are bishops or Primates in those parts of the Anglican communion that “just don’t get it.” This is guaranteed to offend even more people.

21. Encourage students to take courses in Church Planting because it is quite unlikely that they will be hired as clergy in most dioceses in the Episcopal Church, and the Dioceses of new Anglican movements like the ACNA have not been established long enough to actually have existing churches in the places they will likely be pastors. This will drive away those who want a certain future.

22. Be amazed when the largest incoming class in recent history overwhelms the campus in fall 2010, and the majority are under 30 years old.

Perhaps I should add one last point about HOW TO attract young people to your church.
Use contemporary worship with a praise band!
Young people just love churches where aging boomers play electric guitars and sing music with insipid lyrics that sound something like Karen Carpenter might have written if she had a crush on Jesus instead of her imaginary boyfriend.

Young people hate hymns. They hate chant. They hate incense and solemn liturgy.