Noll Soft on Catholicism

Readers may enjoy D. G. Hart's Theology of Scandal from an old issue of the web magazine The New Pantagruel, in which he, a firmly Reformed theologian, reflects on the Evangelical scholar Mark Noll's assessment of relation of Evangelicalism to Catholicism.

He concludes with an observation that our experience as an ecumenical magazine has certainly proved. After analyzing and finding unsatisfactory Noll's definition of Evangelicalism, and making some very tart comments thereon, he writes:

[P]perhaps the best way to judge evangelicalism is by the categories given by our Lord who taught that the work of the Trinity was designed to be unified and coherent. In which case, rather than looking for signs of affect among the born-again, maybe the search should be for evidence of intellect. Ironically, that would draw confessional Protestants and Roman Catholics closer in terms of real togetherness than the pious good wishes of trying to combine the zeal of evangelicals with the forms of Rome.

As I say, we've found this to be true. The people who are most committed, committed to the point of prickliness, to the confessional distinctives of their traditions are also the ones who find working with other prickly confessionalists easiest. The more sentimental and less doctrinal, many of whom love the magazine and its practical expression of Christian unity, sometimes find the actual practice difficult. I'm not really sure why.

Comments

[Jennifer Kee]

Two curmedgeons can appreciate each others' prickliness (and insight) if not their doctrine.

A sentimentalist will find a doctrinally differing curmudgeon overpowering and a doctrinally differing sentimentalist incomprehensible.

The solution? Run away!

[Will S.]

Some relevant quotes from Chronicles Magazine:

From Aaron Wolf (Lutheran), here:

There will be no passion for the truth—no nerve—in the hearts of Christians in American churches, unless Lutherans, Catholics, Presbyterians, Baptists, etc., rediscover their own identities. Until that happens, joint campaigns of resistance against common enemies such as militant Islam will also lack nerve, and probably will not even be mounted. That goes for efforts to restore the civilization of Christendom as well.

And from Srdja Trifkovic (Eastern Orthodox), here:

let us not even pretend that Europe is still Christian. Today there are more Muslims at prayer on Fridays in Britain, France, or Germany than there are Christians at mass or liturgy in those countries on Sundays. To change this, Christian traditionalists belonging to different denominations should forge anti-ecumenical unity...

I think they're both onto something; we need to recover our own identities, work on our own houses; at the same time, we can, as we become more grounded in the faith, as expressed in our different traditions, find a basis for unity on matters of common interest without trying to minimize our differences, sweep them under the rug, or, even worse, watering down our respective traditions to try to accommodate each other. Let's not fall into that trap. Rather, let's aim for Trifkovic's "anti-ecumenical unity", against common foes. If we don't preserve our distinctives, we will already lose who we are without needing external foes to do it to us! Let's rediscover our traditions, and yes, that means teaching our children and brethren within each of our respective traditions why the others are wrong and we are right, but nevertheless come together politically for common cause.

[David Palmer]

With all this talk about Evangelicals and Catholics, I thought I might tell you a (naughty) little joke:

A little boy was walking down a dirt road after church one Sunday afternoon when he came to a crossroads where he met a little girl coming from the other direction.

"Hello," said the little boy.

"Hi," replied the little girl.

"Where are you going?" asked the little boy.

"I've been to church this morning and I'm on my way home," answered the little girl.

"Me too," replied the little boy. "I'm also on my way home from church. Which church do you go to?"

"I go to the Presbyterian church back down the road," replied the little girl. "What about you?"

"I go to the Catholic church back at the top of the hill," replied the little boy.

They discover they are both going the same way so they decided that they'd walk together. They came to a low spot in the road where spring rains had
partially flooded the road so there was no way they could get across to the other side without getting wet. "If I get my new Sunday dress wet my Mum's
going to skin me alive," said the little girl.

"My Mum'll tan my hide too if I get my new Sunday suit wet," replied the little boy.

"I tell you what I think I'll do," said the little girl. "I'm going to pull off all my clothes and hold them over my head and wade across."

"That's a good idea," replied the little boy. "I'm going to do the same thing with my suit."

So they both undressed and waded across to the other side without getting their clothes wet.

They were standing there in the sun waiting to drip dry before putting their clothes back on when the little boy finally remarked, "You know, I never did realize before just how much difference there really is between a
Presbyterian and a Catholic."

[Will S.]

LOL! Cute.