Is heresy better than schism?

According to Fr. Thomas Hopko, error does not rise to the level of heresy until there is a schism. That is to say, heresy equals error plus division. So your article contains a false dichotomy. According to Hopko, it should be "Is error better than schism?"

Bravo, Major Wooten.
Thank you for quoting Matt. 15:12. That verse answers something I have been struggling with. You just ministered to me.

Many ''schisms'' historically occured for purely political reasons, such as this one, and such as the Persian schism of the fourth century. Henry VIII anyone ? Why Henry VIII was Defensor Fidei, a doctrinally orthodox man until his tragic divorce(s).

The Roman Empire and Iran were authoritarian regimes that could not stand to have Christians of the same stripe living side by side. So the Persians named heretical bishops who simply assumed that there was a schism. And there was, and there still is in some places.

Church-style faith implies a kind of ''communion'', it is when you can share the body and blood of Jesus without sensing a deep conflict. No one has their ''own God'', no one. Jesus did not have 200 Last Suppers, he only had One.

Now for one, I can understand those who say that the Lord Jesus-Christ did not sanction gay marriage, as he certainly didn't ; he was in my view the same loving God in the Old Testament who denounced the crimes of Sodom.

By offering that schism is preferable to error, you join the "Old Believers" and "Old Calendarists" in raising non-essentials to the level of essentials.

No, I don't. I prefer charity in non-essentials, but orthodoxy in essentials. Surely we can all agree that there are some essentials that are non-negotiable. If the only non-negotiable essential is unity, then game over -- there can be, then, no such thing as heresy.

Are there any Christians, of the left or the right, who would believe that unity is the only essential aspect of church life? That they would stay in a church and put up with anything at all for the sake of unity? I don't think so.

I thought I made it fairly clear in my original post that I was asking about essentials (though certainly we can argue over what constitutes essentials). Again, it all goes back to authority. Once upon a time, I said that I didn't understand why the East-West schism of 1054 was such a big deal -- meaning that I thought arguing over the filioque clause was a classic case of making a non-essential into an essential. Well, I was wrong about that, not only because there are profound theological implications behind the "filio que", but also because the way the Creed was changed -- imposed by the Bishop of Rome -- mattered enormously in terms of where the authority for church governance resided (that is, within the office of the Roman pope, or within Church councils)?

There is no easy answer -- as one poster said, this question is very old. But as a member of a schismatic Presbyterian denomination, I would suggest that schism is overrated. There is the positive aspect of greater truth and purity. But please realize that schismatic churches tend to disproportionally attract schismatic personalities and individuals who definitely do not "work and play well with others". My own congregation has had blowups every 10 years or so since it has been in existence (mid-1930's), and various additional groupings have formed. A liberal PCUSA pastor once told me that "a difficult unity is better than an easy separation". I scoffed at him at the time, but now I think he may be right.

jestrfyl:

Allow me to offer a different point of view on how you are characterizing "schismatics" and "heretics."

Let's say you've got a baseball team. What the team does, as an institution, is play baseball. And you're good at it.

One day, somebody comes along with a tennis racket and wants to take an "at-bat" with the racket instead a bat. You point out that the game is designed to be played with a bat, and the ball is intended, as thrown, to be hit with a bat. Hitting a pitched ball with a tennis racket will, arguably, even do quite a bit of damage to the racket. Nonetheless, this person doesn't listen, and is adamant that they be allowed a turn with the racket.

Over time, this person continues to insist on changes to the rules of how the team plays baseball so that it looks increasingly like tennis -- so much so, that a lot of tennis players are attracted, who have no interest in playing baseball, but are really interested in playing this version of tennis that happens to be called "baseball."

Eventually, those who were on the team back when they were actually playing baseball tell the tennis players, "Sorry, but this is a *baseball* team. If you want to play tennis, go play tennis and call it tennis. There's no reason for us to have to play something that isn't baseball while still calling it baseball, and there's no reason for you to be rewriting the rules of baseball when what you really want to play is tennis. If you aren't willing to abide by that, we'll just leave, take our equipment with us, and actually play *baseball* someplace else." By now, of course, the tennis players won't do any such thing -- they have a certain amount of popularity that they wouldn't have had as tennis players just by virtue of calling it "baseball," plus there's some notoriety in a bunch of tennis players insisting on calling it "baseball." So, naturally, they characterize the original baseball players as people saying, "If you won't play by our rules, we'll just pack up our ball and go home."

From the perspective of those in this extended metaphor whom you might characterize as the "schismatics," is it accurate to characterize the "heretics" as those who "take the relationship seriously enough to stay and keep at it"? Perhaps they take the relationship seriously, at least as they see it, but they sure don't take *baseball* seriously, or they wouldn't be so adamant about turning it into tennis.

I mean, when I realized that I wanted to be Orthodox, I had to go out and convert. I knew I wasn't going to get very far trying to get ECUSA to become OCUSA. However, the factions within ECUSA who seem to want it to be Unitarian Universalist or Congregationalist or Metropolitan Community Church or whatever seem dead set on making it so, rather than simply going out and joining one of those organizations. Maybe you consider that "more dramatic, more intriguing, and more fun," but I consider that wanting to change the game while keeping the name.

Richard

You can pit tradition against conscience, but I don't see how you can bring scripture in with only the former. The ways of reading scripture that ban homosexuality, e.g., produce incoherence and anachronism in other matters. There's no single hermeneutic that can produce all the ends the various camps desire. The Bible is a collection of narratives that describe a set of relationships between God and man in various situations. If you think you can read your own conscience and societal context out of the equation, you're not even seeing how those relationships appear in scripture. You're just making it serve your own desire for power over others.

Rod wrote: "I prefer charity in non-essentials, but orthodoxy in essentials. Surely we can all agree that there are some essentials that are non-negotiable. If the only non-negotiable essential is unity, then game over -- there can be, then, no such thing as heresy."

Yes, but your examples are not essentials but highly-charged culture-war issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion. This is not to say that they are unimportant -- it is simply to say that you are playing a rhetorical sleight-of-hand with your clarification.

It is my understanding that essentials of the faith are contained, more or less, in the Creeds (Nicene, Apostolic, &c. -- how far along you go probably has something to do with where you fit in the Orthodox / Catholic / Protestant gamut.) The Creeds are certainly not sufficient in themselves to tell us how to live, but they contain, it seems to me, the merest form of what one must do if one is to intelligibly call oneself a Christian. The essentials, as it were.

I don't see your examples in the Creeds anywhere. It seems to me that someone could possibly support both same-sex marriage and legal abortion and still believe the Creeds. I would not like to try, my own self, but I see nothing to indicate that it is impossible.

In regard to the Episcopal Church (my beloved home), I would argue that for many the debate is not over homosexuality, but rather Biblical authority and the nature of Christ. For one, our Presiding Bishop stated in an interview that, "Christians understand that Jesus is the route to God. Umm– that is not to say that Muslims, or Sikhs, or Jains, come to God in a radically different way. They come to God through...human experience...through human experience of the divine. Christians talk about that in terms of Jesus."

It seems the head of the ECUSA is afraid to say that some folks might be going to hell.

"Yes, but your examples are not essentials but highly-charged culture-war issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion. This is not to say that they are unimportant -- it is simply to say that you are playing a rhetorical sleight-of-hand with your clarification."

They touch on issues regarding the 10 Commandments--pretty important. And no, in the literalistic sense, they aren't directly assessed in the text. Nonetheless, I think by any Orthodox, Catholic, or High Church Anglican standard, issues such as abortion and homosexuality are all tied to the ten commandments, as are most questions of morality.

It's hard to tie discussions such as this to the Old Believers in Russian Orthodoxy, who broke away apparently over liturgical practice.

Additionally, while this breakaway occurred in the context of the ordination of gay bishop who was openly living with his partner, it's hard to view this in isolation. The pot has been brewing at boiling point for a long time, and this line in the sand concept is a reflection of the fact that the conservatives don't think they have a snowballs chance in hell of having a future in the Episcopal Church.

It certainly is an interesting time to have just converted to Episcopalianism. . .

My conscience forced me out of the Lutheran church (WELS synod). Now I suppose I will remain Episcopal unless or until my conscience declares it's time for another revolt.

Where's God in all this?

"Where's God in all this?"

Weeping, perhaps, on behalf of the unborn.

Sorry to be a bit sarcastic, but it's all too simplistic to dismiss these discussions as debates about the number of angels on the pin of a needle.

Ah, Wellsy,
what a relevant question. God has no role to play here. This taking sides and splitting up 'over non-negotiables' has been going on forever.

Of course, as time goes on, that 'radically under 1% (followers of ancient traditions), 4% (Republican National Committee on election results) 2-3% (sociologists in the US considering only those who self-identify as 100% gay), 7% in Scotland, 0% (cause they murdered all of us) in Iran...10% according to Kinsey...anyway, as time goes by, a small but noticeable number of children of these break-away people will turn out to be gay. A rather larger number will be divorced and remarried. An enormous number of their daughters will have 'seven-month' pregnancies following on to their shot-gun weddings...and soon enough there will, again, yet again, arise a dispute over some element of true belief which is so fundamental, so non-negotiable, it would simply be heresy to remain with the unbelievers.

You either accept that Jesus meant 'everybody' when he said 'everybody' or you don't.

Rod, one of the saddest consequences for people like you and Erin is that you are aligning yourselves increasingly with people who are not ultra-conservative because they have followed your thoughts and prayers, but because they are filled with hatred toward women and gays. Even Erin recently noted that, to her personal discomfiture, she was beginning to see sound reason for potentially allowing as to how global warming might, under certain circumstances, possibly be caused by and capable of remediation through man. Most of the people sharing your views on us believe as they do out of intellectual laziness, hatred and fear.

I suspect you, and the very few truly spiritual people apart from yourself who are now breaking with progressive Christianity will very soon find yourselves disenchanted with your fellows.

And thus, a new schism will be born.

Oh, a personal note. Can you do anything about this horrid software? It just ate another text I wrote. I'm thinking in one language, writing in another and that is tough enough without having to fight with this interface. Thanks!

In reply to an earlier comment, the PB said (and I quote) that Jesus is one way to God.

ECUSA made a unilateral decision to break with the Anglican Communion when it consecrated a homoactive priest to become bishop of New Hampshire. This months after PB Grizwold had stated that no such thing would occur.
The consequence of this action was that ECUSA was declared to be in impaired communion within many provinces of the communion and broken communion with a number of others. Nothing in Damon's article alludes to this single action as causing a massive schism within the Anglican communion. The 100,000 (and counting) who believe that ECUSA has deviated from the traditions of the church and the Authority and plain meaning of the Holy Scriptures are not causing a schism (except within ECUSA) in the Anglican Communion. The schism ensuing from the deviation of ECUSA away from Christian belief. Despite the smaller numbers, schism in the American Episcopal has not been caused by those who have left -they remain true

If you believe that Scripture, or Scripture and the institutional Church, is the Authority for deciding questions of meaning and morality, then you are far more likely to fall on the traditionalist side of these questions. If you believe that individual conscience is the Authority, then you are likely to be a progressive.

I think this very seriously misreads the stance of the progressives.

My characterization of the progressive view would be that their fellow church members who disagree with them are relying on bits and pieces of Scripture and tradition in compromised and erroneous ways while ignoring important aspects of Scripture and tradition that contradict their views.

The obvious example that comes to mind -- and I would like to use something less provocative here, but please bear with me -- is segregation. When segregation was the rule, it was generally acknowledged that there was substantial Scriptural and traditional support for not mixing the races (indeed, if you Google, you can find that kind of thing today). The progressive religious position rejected those interpretations of Scripture and tradition and emphasized other aspects of Scripture such as Christ's teachings on love (even though those teachings do not expressly address racial segregation). The progressive religionists most assuredly did not concede that the segregationists had the better of the argument as to Scripture and tradition, nor did they claim that individual conscience should override those things.

I don't mean to use that example to demonstrate that the progressive religionists of our own day have the better of the argument. (I think they do, but that's an argument for another time.) My point is simply that it is not accurate to understand today's progressives as conceding that they stand opposed to Scripture and tradition.

Re: Moreover, they formulated canons and declared other bodies of canons authoritative--with consequences for transgressing them (penance, temporary excommunication, removal from ranks of clergy, or anathema).

Yes, and many of those canons are universally honored in the breach. Know any bishops who make their official visits riding on the back of a white mule? Per the formal canons of the Church (at least in the East) they are supposed to. Do you kneel in church on Sunday? By the Nicene Council, you shouldn't. For that matter, does anyone at your church work at a bank or other lending facility? They should be excommunicated as userers per several medieval Western Councils. On matters of faith and theology the Councils are authoritative. On matters of praxis and daily living the canons are not-- unless of course we're all heretics.

Re: Are there matters over which there can be no compromise, and in which a compromise would destroy the essence of the institution?

Yes, certainly. But there are also matters where compromise is allowable, especially when one can find precedent in tradition. I would not be opposed to the restoration of the female diaconate, since that was a long-lived ad successful tradition in the East. But I would not wish to see female Orthodox priests, since that is wholly outside tradition. And I could tolerate the revival of the old adelphopoiesis rite to bless same sex couples-- but not gay matrimony.
It is a cliche of course, but the Church is a hospital for sinners, not a museum for saints. i's need not be dotted and t's need not be crossed as long as Christ remains supreme.
And beware of turning the Church into a Political Action Committee. That error ruined liberal mainline Protestantism (and once upon a time political preoccupations instigated vast corruption and wickedness in the Roman Church). The Church is not about worldly politics.

Re: ECUSA made a unilateral decision to break with the Anglican Communion when it consecrated a homoactive priest to become bishop of New Hampshire.

Oh nonsense! If the consecration of a single sinning bishop invalidates a church, then the Church of Christ died aborning. Good grief. Strictly speaking, the ordination and consecration of women is more problematic than that of gay men-- as the matter has been far from unknown in the past.

Dan-o,
I was not referring to the people who are arguing so thoughtfully here. You are a minority among those with whom you are now joining forces.

Eventually, most thoughtful Christians come to terms with the natural sciences. It may be painful, but all those silly little things we people were burned at the stake for, tortured and imprisoned like a round earth, a heliocentric world view, blacks being equal to whites...we laugh about them today, but they were the gay-rights issues of their day and fought with just as much vigor as Christians in the US debate my status as a human today.

Unfortunately, there is also a group, an enormously larger group, of very conservative Christians who reject the modern world and see this as yet another battle in their never-ending culture war. You will soon discover that they possess no theology, no depth, no logic and not willingness to embrace those issues of faith to which we are called. For them, everything is black and white, their Christianity defined by their hatred.

If you take a look at the occasional postings from them here or scan the internet for their comments, I think you will discover that the purity of communion you seek is the echo of unexamined and unreflected egoism. They will soon find you out and reject you for possessing both mind and spirit. Then, I think, you will seek to find a modus vivendi with gay Christians and female Christians who demand full human status.

Why are the 7 Ecouncils considered authoritative? In theory because they simply enshrined what the Church already believed and practiced (usually by adding formal, technical language or legal force). In practice they are an authority because the living Tradition of the Church says they are.

In theory a new council could change things in the previous councils, if one looks at them as legislative events. But they aren't (they are much more like Supreme Court decisions in the US). They establish precedent and a part from correcting errors in other councils where it was believed that the legislative (that is the technical apparatus of a council) process was used to attempt to coerce the Church to alter the faith handed down from the Apostles.

Even if it were possible to find some minor exceptions where particular Bishops or even local councils occasionally accepted, permitted or even blessed abortions, gay marriages, female priests, whatever; they would still remain an outlier in the extremely negative prejudicial sense.

Analogies to segregation and slavery (largely the result of socio-economic not moral changes) don't fit because segregation and slavery might still be necessary and even good under the right conditions. Slavery can be moral if executed morally and in accordance with scripture. The picture of slavery in pre-industrial colonialism was fraught with terrible errors, but slavery itself, isn't an amoral institution.

Our modern employment system (particularly the at-will variety) might actually be WORSE than serfdom because unlike vassals who the King had an obligation to protect and serve, as employees our employers largely take no more obligation to our welfare than they are required by force of law.

All that aside, what's really going on here is that people want to make things up for themselves. They see no value in submission, humility, dispassion, forbarence, self-sacrifice, etc. They are consumed with modern notions of self-actualization, celebrating personal achievement and individuality (that is individuals as autonomous).

The truth is, none of these folks have any real interest in the work of the Church for salvation. They just want to do what they want to do. I came to the Church to dispose of my willfulness, not indulge it. I came to become a slave to Christ. I have little interest in "freedom" or "equality" as defined by moderns. I honestly believe that 2000 years of Church history and much of the history of the Hebrews before that bares out that this is the better way.

If an when modern society collapses, either for socio-economic reasons or because of moral disaster the older, truer anthropology will out.

The presumption is that the Episcopal Church is, in fact, as currently formed, a Christian body. A good case could be made that its not those currently identified as 'schismatics" who've actually left the Church.

One can also have a disagreement on what Scripture actually says, and that generations of tradition have interpreted it wrongly.

Myself, I'm not a literalist, but I have no problem with those who claim inerrancy of Scripture. However, the reader may, and often is, errant.

Anon,
Anon,
I object to all perversions of Christ's message to justify hatred and discrimination against other people. There is no conflict between my love for my husband and my being a Christian.

As for engagement, dear sir, it is you who have attacked me, not the other way 'round.

Science reveals that my sexuality is a normal variation, probably a useful adjunct to increased female fertility (non-fertile males who have familial sense are useful to have around when you have a plethora of children). Take a look at the professions in which homosexuals are over-represented. Teaching, medicine, natural science, policing, to name but a few). You are the one who refuses to accept the evidence before your very eyes.

There is nothing anyone can offer you which will change your self-righteous conceits.

The implication that I reject actions having consequences is so gravely insulting, I must give you credit. I don't think I could have come up with anything that nasty if I'd used both hands and had two weeks time.

Guess I really hit a sore point, huh? Having decided to lie with dogs, you can not now complain when you wake up with fleas.

Panthera,

I have two arguments for you.

1.Do I need to remind you of all the times that Science has been wrong in the past? Science almost never can make Truth claims. They can only make claims about fact. They can say that homoerotic behavior exists in nature. They cannot say whether it is "good" or not or whether it fits with "natural law" in the classical sense. Science also told us that travelling > 25 MPH would kill a person and that the earth was the center of the universe. Science told us that native people from Africa were less intelligent tha other peoples.

2. Just because something occurs in nature that does not mean it is a moral good. Pedophiles do not choose to be pedophiles - there is something hard wired in them. I've met a fair few in prison and they tell me they don't understand their attraction and can't seem to change it. There is strong evidence that male promiscuity is natural in humans - that does not make it good. Murder is natural in nature (ask the lion and the zebra). Murder is not good. Nature is, as we say in the Church, fallen.

If you would ask the Church to change what it considers sinful, then you need to make arguments from the Church's sources of authority and the primary source of authority in any Christian Church is Holy Scripture.

Phil

Deacon Phil Snyder,

You wrote the following in one of your comments on your blog: "I don't care if anyone listens to my witness. I am not called to be successful. Like the watchman on the tower, I am called to raise the alarm. If no one heeds the alarm, their blood is on their own hands."

I should like to politely point out to you the unspoken underlying premise in your analogy, which when illuminated, will then totally undercut the rhetorical force of your argument-by-analogy.

It is this: Your argument presumes that only an "insider" can raise the alarm. This is false, and I respect your acumen in now knowing that this presumption in your unspoken premise is false. An outsider can certainly raise the alarm just as well.

Furthermore, in continuing your analogy of an inside watchman who's faithfully raising the alarm, let me respectfully point out yet another fatally flawed weakness in your argument: By you, the watchman, staying and remaining inside an officially apostate institution, the people hearing your alarm will likely conclude, "The apostasy and heresy must not really be that bad. After all, the watchman himself is staying. Therefore, if he can live with it, so can we."

Please do consider the possibility that you may be doing more damage to yourself and to others by staying and rationalizing that you are a faithful alarm-raising watchman/inside witness.

Pax.

YBIC,

Truth Unites... and Divides

Phil,
I do appreciate your civil tone. For a group of people who like to refer to ourselves as Christians, we surely are one of the nastiest collection of bloggers of whom I know.

Obviously we are frequently mistaken in our observations of the natural world. This is why a scientifically formulated hypothesis is to be capable of disproof, not proof.

That said, I do not ask the Church to change one iota of her beliefs.

My position is, quite simply, there is no scientific basis, there is no basis in psychology, medicine or sociology for the discrimination against homosexuals which we experience under American law.

Either we are equal citizens and our rights are being denied on principles which stand in conflict with our society or we are a theocracy - in which case, whose? You might want to give that one a thought.

The odds that rational Jesuits or mild-tempered Benedictine discipline would be proclaimed the State religion are not good - it's usually open season upon you and the LDS, alongside the Jews and us...your current treaty is one of a very fragile peace.

'Tis better to fight for a society which lets you practice your Christianity and me mine without government interference. That is, in the end, the logical consequence of your continued attempts to repress me - a theocracy...and trust me on this, it will be one of the knot-headed know-nothings who pop up here occasionally.

I'm out of here for a while. Can't say it's been fun, the viciousness and hatred are overwhelming.

pantera,

i am sorry if you took my post personally. it was meant to be challenging not personal as christianity is challenging.

As far as self righteous conceits, I follow the teachings of the catholic church. Even the difficult ones that i might not fully understand.

just because someone has a natural inclination to an act doesn't make it moral.

Good Luck

Panthera, to accuse people of being full of viciousness and hatred can itself be a hateful accusation. Is it possible you are projecting?

Based on your comments, I assume you will consider me a "hateful" person, since my views are similar to Rod, Erin, etc. So I'd like to ask you what I should do.

I believe that after Christ died and resurrected, the Holy Spirit was poured out on the church. One of the consequences was that apostles were raised up to complete the word of God, including Paul.

So when the apostle Paul says very explicitly that someone who practices homosexuality cannot inherit the kingdom of God, I believe that is God's word, as surely as the literal words of Jesus Himself. Paul was speaking from/by the Spirit.

So for this reason I cannot condone or sanction gay marriage. My question: What would you have me do? Reject the clear word of the Bible in order to become more "loving" and progressive, or be faithful to the clear teaching of the apostle Paul?

quote: "Either we are equal citizens and our rights are being denied on principles which stand in conflict with our society or we are a theocracy - in which case, whose? You might want to give that one a thought."

LOL! If rejecting "gay marriage" makes us a "theocracy" (a much abused term on the left), then the United States has been a "theocracy" from the very beginning up until the present. Heck, until the 1970s the vast majority of atheists and agnostics in this country saw homosexual behavior as abnormal and immoral and wouldn't have dreamed of supporting "gay marriage." By your logic that "opposing gay marriage makes one a theocrat" the vast majority of atheists and agnostics in this country in say 1965 were all theocrats. So while your accusation makes for good emotional rhetoric, it doesn't make any sense whatsoever.

rr

Excellent comment from Alicia - thank you. I appreciate when persons on the "other side of the debate" can be so honest and frank. For months this has been my thought - even "religious progressives" should be deeply troubled and concerned about how their agenda is being advanced. The means matter at least as much as the ends yes?

Re: Then this whopper: "there is no basis in psychology, medicine or sociology for the discrimination against homosexuals."

Um, it happens to be absolutely correct. STDs are transmitted by any sort of sex, the culprit is generally promiscuity not sexual orientation. Depression visits all sorts of people. The priest's wife at my church in Michigan suffered from it, and I don't think that meant she was a miserable sinner, and should have been discriminated against. And chronic depression appears to be genetic (or at biochemical) in origin. Perhaps it patterns with the gay genes too? I don't think there's any genetic work suggesting that. As for procreation, gays can have children if they desire; there is no physical malfunction preventing this; and for those who don't wqant children, what is it to you or anyone else? Lots of people have no children, notably celibate clergy and monastics.
I am sympathetic toward people who dislike being called bigots because of their moral beliefs. But when you cross the line into suggesting actual legal discrmination is justified against this or that group, well, I know of no other word to use except bigotry.

But I am inclined to think of schism as the second-worst option, if the only other is to accomodate one's church to a serious heresy.

But what is a "serious heresy"? The consistent view of the Fathers was that a serious heresy was one that involved the Trinity or the Incarnation. They always refused to break communion over lesser issues. While the top leaders of TEC probably do hold heretical views on the Incarnation, these were not the presenting issue of those who have recently broken away from TEC - at least they have not described the basis of their schism in those terms.

The result of the Episcopal schism will be two decidedly Protestant denominations - one Liberal, the other Evangelical, and neither Anglican in any traditional sense. I do not foresee a place for traditional Anglo-Catholics in either post-Anglican denomination - that's why I became Orthodox.