If you’re just tuning in, for the past few months I’ve been making a threefold case:
Happy exceptions aside, the churches here in Roanoke exist in a state of unrecognized schism from each other (though now and then we do recognize our divisions, sometimes bitterly, usually with an air of indifference).
For the glory of King Jesus, the salvation of the lost, the peace of the city, and our own joy, catholic Christians ought to do something about this: repent, pray, gather in synod, hammer out a common confession, worship together, go on mission together, and above all preach the gospel.
The saving gospel of Jesus Christ, present with and for his people in preaching and sacrament, is the one thing necessary for the church to be the church. Just so, the gospel — that is, the Lord Jesus himself present in his gospel — is the unum necessarium, the treasure hidden in the field, the pearl of great price, the one reality necessary for the churches here to come together, in truth and love, visibly and in the Spirit, as the one Church of Roanoke.
That third bullet is the silver one, drawn from article 7 of the Augsburg Confession. Call it “Lutheran” if you must, but from the get-go in June 1530 it’s been offered as a proposal to the whole Church (and in the event, not just Lutheran but also Reformed and Anglican churches have adopted it). This ecclesiology is evangelical in its resolute focus on the gospel of Jesus Christ as the sufficient power of God to save, sustain, and perfect his church. It is catholic, first, in its emphasis on Word & sacrament as the effectual means of delivering the saving gospel to God’s people; second, in its generous affirmation of the universal church-of-churches summoned into being by the gospel thus delivered.
The next question to tackle is: are bishops — and the presbyters ordained by them — necessary for the Word & sacrament delivery system that alone creates and sustains God’s church?
The “Catholic” View
The brilliant John Henry Newman (1801-90) was still an Anglican priest when he wrote in the second Tract for the Times:
There is on earth an existing Society, Apostolic as founded by the Apostles, Catholic because it spreads its branches in every place; i.e. the Church Visible with its Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. And this surely is a most important doctrine; for what can be better news to the bulk of mankind than to be told that CHRIST when He ascended, did not leave us orphans, but appointed representatives of Himself to the end of time?
And in the first:
We have been born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of GOD. The LORD JESUS CHRIST gave His SPIRIT to His Apostles; they in turn laid their hands on those who should succeed them; and these again on others; and so the sacred gift has been handed down to our present Bishops, who have appointed us as their assistants, and in some sense representatives … We must necessarily consider none to be really ordained who have not thus been ordained.
The theory is straightforward: where there are no real bishops — viz. no “apostolic” bishops ordained in succession from the apostles — there are no real presbyters (or priests) either, and therefore no real sacraments, and therefore no real churches. To be sure, there are many “sincere Christians scattered through the world”: Lutherans, Baptists, Methodists, and such. But lacking apostolic bishops, they do not belong to the Catholic Church. And outside the Catholic Church, there is no salvation. Newman quotes John Pearson (1613-86), the Caroline divine:
CHRIST never appointed two ways to heaven, nor did He build a Church to save some, and make another institution for other men's salvation. There is none other name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved, but the name of JESUS; and that name is no otherwise given under heaven than in the Church.
As far as I can tell, only the Eastern Orthodox (and the more zealous among them at that) still quite believe this. Since Vatican II, the Roman church has acknowledged the fully-ecclesial standing of her Eastern sister churches and the real elements of saving grace at work in the “ecclesial communities” that descend from the Reformation. The most Catholic among the Anglicans pretty much follow suit. A Lutheran pastor, lacking valid ordination, may not be a “real” presbyter the way Orthodox, Roman, and Anglican priests are. But the sacraments he administers are probably real in some sense; the ecclesial community he serves is in some sense “church”: and in any case, his parishioners are not in imminent danger of damnation for mere lack of a bishop.
Where the old “no bishop, no church” theory still holds more sway than you might think is the sphere of ecumenism. The aforementioned Lutheran pastor may not be shooting blanks when he presides at the Supper. Maybe he is; maybe he isn’t. But if he intends to minister in an Anglican parish, let alone a Roman or Orthodox one, he is going to be (re-)ordained by a bishop in the succession first. Otherwise, who can know for sure that the ministry he exercises is genuinely apostolic, that the sacraments he serves Christ’s people are real? For the same reason, congregations standing outside the succession can’t be regarded with confidence as churches in the assured, apostolic sense. Maybe they are, maybe they aren’t. If such ecclesial communities wish to enter into communion with the Catholic Church, it will be by the authority and grace of an apostolic bishop.
Let’s put some flesh on these bones with a bit of local ecumenical cartography. On this “Catholic” view, in Roanoke there are at most a dozen real churches and possibly as few as three. For the Orthodox, it’s just Holy Trinity, St Ambrose, and St Innocent; for these are the three parishes led by priests who have been ordained by bishops in the genuine succession guarded in the Orthodox Church. Outside them, nothing is sure. For the Roman Catholic, the real churches here are St Andrew’s, St Gerard’s, OLN, and St Elias, plus the three Orthodox already mentioned, plus the Coptic church, St Mary’s. The Catholic Anglicans add CHS, Covenant REC, St Peter and Paul, and St Thomas of Canterbury to the tally. Outside these fortunate flocks, there are many ecclesial communities of varying quality but no churches in the full sense.
What are we evangelical catholics to make of this?
The good, the bad, and the problem of history
There is much to commend it. To start seeing why, consider another quote — supplied by Newman in Tract 2 — from Bishop Pearson:
There is a necessity of believing the Catholic Church, because except a man be of that he can be of none. Whatsoever Church pretendeth to a new beginning, pretendeth at the same time to a new Churchdom, and whatsoever is so new is none.
True, that. The one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church is the only Church there is. Every “church” that claims to mark a new beginning deserves those scare quotes. For since the day of Pentecost, there has been no radically new beginning in the history of God’s church. Radical, in the sense of a new radix, a new root, cut off from our roots in the past: radical also in the related, revolutionary sense of an ancient society and regime overthrown in favor of something absolutely new.
There are, alas, many Protestants (and Pentecostals) who want to be radical. These, usually, have no interest in being catholic Christians, and it is hard to see how they are. The churches of the Reformation, however, intended no such radical break. This was true above all of the north German, Scandinavian, and English churches. Indeed, in some cases, the evangelical catholics retained both the office and succession of bishops: in Sweden, Finland, Latvia, Estonia, and England. Even in Wittenberg, Pastor Bugenhagen and Dr Luther waited until 1535 to begin ordaining new men to the ministry; by their own testimony, had the Saxon bishops embraced the gospel, they would not have taken this solemn duty upon themselves to perform. For it was not their intention to start anything new, merely to recover the apostolic gospel and to see to it that every aspect of the catholic church’s worship, ministry, and life be permeated by its singular power to save, sustain, and sanctify. The continuity of bishops in historic succession is a valuable sign of the church’s own continuous life as the visible society of God in every time and place. And Cyprian was right: outside this church, there is no salvation (extra ecclesia nulla salus) — an ancient maxim expressly upheld by the Reformation confessions.
Yet not all is well in the Catholic view. It imagines, in effect, a pipeline of grace extending not mainly through space but through time. The apostles struck oil, as it were; ever since, the oil of the Spirit, grace, and salvation has flowed through their successors into the churches. “What can be better news,” Newman asks, “than to be told that CHRIST when he ascended, did not leave us as orphans, but appointed representatives of Himself to the end of time?” Hm. How about this: that Christ, when he ascended, poured out the gift of the Holy Spirit upon his church, and has never yet stopped pouring him out through the preaching of his gospel. Or this: “I am with you always, even to the end of the age” (Matt 28.19). Or this: “I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes” (Rom 1.16). Or indeed this, brother John: “God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish, but have eternal life” (John 3.16).
Newman’s allusion to John 14.18 is unmistakable: “I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you.” Tellingly, he obscures the Lord’s promise of His own coming, with the Father, in the Spirit, to indwell those who love him (see esp. v. 23) by wrenching it out of context and misapplying it to (of all people) bishops. The trouble in the second block quote from Tract 1 is similar: the promise of supernatural regeneration by grace through faith in John 1.12-13 becomes a guarantee of supernatural ordination by the Spirit channeled through the succession of bishops. A disastrous misreading, that; but again, a telling one. To the bishops is diverted what belongs by right to Jesus Christ alone. He does not need bishops because He is not dead — or trapped in history or in heaven — but very much alive, present with, and active for his people, by his Spirit, through his Word and sacraments, to the glory of our Father. It is by baptism, not by bishops, that man is reborn: “Truly, truly, I say to you: unless a man is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God” (John 3.5). It is by the living word of Jesus Christ, not by any preacher, that the dead are raised to life: “Truly, truly, I say to you: the hour is coming, and is now here, when the dead will hear the voice of the Son of God, and those who hear will live” (John 5.25). It is by the Eucharist, not by any presiding liturgist, that Christ’s church is nourished unto eternal life: “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6.53f).
The church does not need the pipeline of grace to be catholic. She needs Jesus, the Living One, the Son of Man who walks in the midst of the lampstands, to pour upon her the Oil of gladness through his gospel.
Besides, the pipeline never existed in the first place. But to prove that will have to wait for the next installment.