Author Archive
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Sunday, June 6th, 2010
The central teaching of Jesus Christ in John’s Gospel concerning the Holy Spirit is found in chapters 14 and 16 of the Fourth Gospel. The Presiding Bishop of The Episcopal Church is representative of the view that the Holy Spirit (or “the Spirit”) is responsible for endorsing a new understanding of sexual relationships as appropriate for members of the same gender. The warrant for this view more widely held is John 16: God the Holy Spirit is ‘leading the church into a truth’ the church has not known until now, and continues not to know elsewhere, as God has spoken this to The Episcopal Church (“The Spirit does seem to be saying to many within The Episcopal Church that gay and lesbian persons are God’s good creation, that an aspect of good creation is the possibility of lifelong, faithful partnership, and that such persons may indeed be good and healthy exemplars of gifted leadership within the Church, as baptized leaders and ordained ones”). This could either be a matter of timing – so technically God the Holy Spirit speaks only one truth on this matter, and so those who have not heard the Holy Spirit will hear the Holy Spirit leading them into new truth eventually (“Above all, it recognizes that the Spirit may be speaking to all of us, in ways that do not at present seem to cohere or agree. It also recognizes what Jesus says about the Spirit to his followers, “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come” [John 16:12-13]) – or it could be that the Holy Spirit endorses diversity of hearings (“That growing awareness does not deny the reality that many Anglicans and not a few Episcopalians still fervently hold traditional views about human sexuality”) . This latter understanding seeks grounding in the Presiding Bishop’s understanding of the Pentecost event of Acts 2 (“Pentecost is most fundamentally a continuing gift of the Spirit, rather than a limitation or quenching of that Spirit”) as contrasted with the Archbishop of Canterbury’s reading of Pentecost as a “single understanding of gospel realities”(as she puts it) in a letter to which she is responding in defense of her own position.
We note in passing that: 1) John’s account of the Holy Spirit involves several aspects, explained in the narrative movement of his Gospel, and that any reading of John needs to be able to integrate all of these if Christ’s teaching is to be coherent as intended (hence Christ’s concern with truth); 2) the Holy Spirit can only with difficulty be seen as ‘inspiring diversity’ in Acts; the tension in the account is between a gift of foreign languages that are heard as intelligible by Jews from the widest geographical reach in their first or native tongues (so Calvin et al); or the gift is of a single tongue language that all these gathered Jews are inspired to hear as intelligible in their native languages; the history of interpretation is not uniform here. But in neither case is the point that the Holy Spirit inspires diversity, but the opposite: the Gospel is heard and received with power because the Holy Spirit overcomes the diversity that has hindered such a reception (the fact that the recipients are all Jews – with some proselytes – who have come to Jerusalem for the Feast of Weeks to hear the marvelous single account of God’s giving of Torah is also missing from her account); and finally 3) an account of John as inspiring a new truth that all will in time come to hear and acknowledge cannot be squared with an account of the Holy Spirit as inspiring or endorsing diversity of hearings.
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June 06 2010 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Saturday, July 11th, 2009
The President of the House of Deputies, in remarks made in an internet-viewable report of a private meeting with the Archbishop of Canterbury, expressed the view that the polity of the Episcopal Church is unique (‘anomalous’)and must be appreciated as such (9 July 2009). This opinion appeared to be directed at an account of the church that has given and gives significant and prioritized room for communications and directives to be made from Bishop to Bishop. Another spokesperson present indicated that the Archbishop was told that communications from the Communion ought to be made to the General Convention, as the only authority able to respond, and not the Bishops.
We can leave to the side whether this account from the President and others is in reality fair, insofar as the Presiding Bishop of this church is a Bishop and is elected by the body presumably seen as unique, and other provinces of the communion could likewise ask for a special appreciation of this or that feature of their polity. Lambeth Conference is an Instrument of Communion and it is comprised of Bishops; the ACC has lay and clerical representation; and so forth. TEC’s polity has never been viewed as a hindrance to involvement in these Instruments before, and it is difficult to see how the General Convention is in some special position of senior authority above the Bishops (see below), or that laity and clergy in this church have ‘equal authority’ (so the President of the House of Bishops).
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July 11 2009 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Tuesday, August 26th, 2008
The ACI is happy to announce that we will be hosting “Anglicanism – A Gift in Christ”: an opportunity to hear gifted theologians and speakers on various topics of theological, biblical, liturgical, and missionary significance: New Testament, Old Testament, Hymnody, Christian Witness in the Muslim World, and the Parish as the Centre of Christian Renewal.
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August 26 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Thursday, August 7th, 2008
We have followed closely the events at Lambeth. We have been pleased at the regular meetings of Communion Partner Bishops together with English Bishops and key Global South Primates. Much hard work and prayerful cooperation was in evidence and we thank God for that.
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August 07 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Thursday, July 17th, 2008
In order properly to appreciate the dynamics of the present season it is imperative to understand the regnant self-perception of progressive Episcopalians (and their friends). It is easy enough to understand that ‘the Global South’ has a different self-understanding than the American one – making allowance for a vast region with different nuances and priorities. It is also critical to contrast the self-understanding of American Episcopalianism with what one finds in the Church of England, where one can of course see kindred concerns for new teaching on sexuality and where one can find allies with the Episcopal causes.
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July 17 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Monday, June 2nd, 2008
The American Episcopal Church has since its inception understood itself to be an integral part of a much broader Anglican reality. Unlike the Methodist Church, for example, it chose not to declare ecclesial independence in the American context, but carefully referred and deferred to the Church of England and to Anglicanism in the wider context of the British Isles. Samuel Seabury sought consecration in the Church of England and when that was not possible for political reasons, he was consecrated in Aberdeen.Though the American Church had functioned without indigenous bishops for many years, when the revolutionary war ended it was deemed desirable and logical for American Bishops to be consecrated, and the oversight that had been exercised from England to be shifted to the New World. That said, matters related to the Book of Common Prayer and even the composition of the General Convention (now with a House of Bishops) were sufficiently weighty that deference to the concerns of the English Bishops was still deemed necessary (place of the Nicene Creed, the descent clause in the Apostles Creed, and so forth).
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June 02 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Thursday, May 15th, 2008
One concern about the covenant process now underway is that the reality of the Communion’s present condition could be bypassed by well-intentioned efforts of a committee to hear everyone and find a common document that proves unable to address a reality.
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May 15 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Thursday, April 10th, 2008
In order both to set limits and for clarity’s sake-themes to which I shall return- the present essay will undertake theological reflection on covenant and the appropriateness of using this term for work presently before us in the Anglican Communion. This requires some threshold consideration. By ‘theological reflection’ I mean, giving a comprehensive account of Scripture with concern for its total, mutually-informing witness. I take this to be the concern of one of the Articles, with a long prior history, that scripture be read in such a way that its portions be not repugnant, one with another. The same concern also animates what in our present period is called ‘canonical reading.’
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April 10 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Saturday, March 29th, 2008
Because of its reflective character, John’s Gospel dwells on details and lets them speak in ways the other Gospels’ proximity and excitement sometimes prevents. The beloved disciple is “he who remains,” abides, literally leans on Jesus, and remaining is a key word in this Gospel. Because remaining allows one the space, the time, even the awkwardness of inaction, to discern and believe.
John does not criticize the active role of apostles; this has its place in God’s plans of sending forth and announcing and doing as Jesus did. But John stays where he is, close to Jesus, and so dwells on details and lets their significance come into focus.
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March 29 2008 | Articles
Written by: Rev. Professor Christopher Seitz
Friday, March 21st, 2008
Good Friday provides us a second occasion-the traditional occasion-to reflect on the Passion of our Lord. The Gospel of John is exactly suited (designed) for this. For it too is a second and more in-depth look at the Passion, than what we had in Matthew on Palm Sunday.
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March 21 2008 | Articles
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