Carnival on Christian Identity

The following is my contribution to Derek the Ænglican’s Carnival on Christian Identity in commemoration of the feast of St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Bishop and Doctor. Because I have been asked to be brief and am normally not, I will proceed by a series of observations on the subjects of the Carnival, some of them disconnected.

On the Canon

1. The question of canon is not “what is text?”, nor is it “how text should be read?” Semiotics answers the former and hermeneutics the latter. The question of text is “What texts should be read more than others?”
2. A friend of mine recently described the literary canon, “the Western canon”, as a “status symbol.” This is to be avoided for the Canon of the Christian Church. The Canon is our common inheritance, preferably even more egalitarian than the literary canon. Nevertheless, I believe the Anglican Reformation was not about increasing individual access to the Canon but instead about ensuring the communal access of all orders of ministry according to their needs. The benefit of such an open interpretive community is accountability that could not be readily sustained in the medieval order of the Western Church; accountability that is not present in the extremes of Protestantism either.
3. May the Lord bless us with Biblical literacy, not Biblical literalism.
4. The Canon is defined ontologically as the nearest emanations of the Divine Word ( logos ) that the Church has found and judged worthy. All truth more or less emanates from the Divine Word in a sort of pneumatological game of telephone, but we believe that the Holy Spirit “τὸ λαλῆσαν διὰ τῶν προφητῶν.” (has spoken through the Prophets), and thus there are presumably some texts that are more truthful than others. Practically, the Canon is defined by its use in Divine Service. Now, of course, there are many texts used in Divine Service, some taken from the Canon or commensurate with it, but the texts of the Canon are unique. We generally speak to God in Divine Service, but in the Canon, we believe that God speaks in the words spoken to our foreparents in faith and thus reveals Himself to us. Therefore, we must be careful about introducing proclamatory texts into Divine Service that are not ordinarily part of the Canon, because by their use in this way, we receive them as the word of God to our peril.
5. Nature is ontologically and practically canonical, ontologically because both Nature and the Holy Scriptures of the Old and New Testament are very close to direct emanations of the Divine Word; practically because the life and death of Jesus the Christ is made present to us most palpably not in the proclamation of the Gospel but in the transformation of those visible creatures of God the Father by the Holy Spirit into the Body and Blood of Christ in the Holy Eucharist and the waters of His death, forgiveness, and regeneration in Holy Baptism.





On the Creeds
1. The question of the Creeds is “What shall we believe that would be most amenable to Christ’s prevention of us.”
2. I refuse to take off my Chalcedonian glasses or give up all Neoplatonic analytical techniques.
3. The Creeds are not the only possible settlement within the bounds of the Canon of the questions they answer. They, however, are the most elegant, parsimonious, and thus presumably veracious statements concerning the nature of the Most Holy and Undivided Trinity.
4. The sense of pisteia (belief) in the Nicene Creed is of an assertion of ontological truth. The sense of credo in the Apostles’ Creed is simultaneously an assertion of ontological truth and of one’s trust in the extant God. The sense of belief in the Athanasian Creed is that you better believe it or else. Thus, the Nicene Creed should be said at the Eucharist, the Apostles’ Creed should be said in the Office, and the Athanasian Creed should be said at the Vigil of Trinity Sunday in some place where no one can hear you and be intimidated.
5. The Athanasian Creed is the ultimate proof that I am not sufficiently afraid of judgment or else lack the intensity of the Fathers.
6. The Creeds challenge the modern mind for all of the wrong reasons. We focus on physics and biology, when we should consider what they teach about incarnation, gender, humility, and our ultimate ends.

Apostolic Succession
1. The apostles were witnesses to the glorified Lord. The usage of apostle in the Scriptures allows for no other reasonable definition. However, the original idea of apostolic succession depended on the relationship of some of the apostles as disciples to the Lord as teacher before and after His glorification. “To the crowds He spoke in parables, but he spoke clearly to His disciples when they were alone.” “And then He unrolled the Scriptures to them.” After the Lord was glorified, there was no need for secret teaching, so his disciples proclaimed His teachings openly and argued against a series of “apostolic competitors” throughout the Levant and Asia Minor while revealing this previously secret knowledge. The apostolic succession is ultimately the transmission in fidelity of the plain truth that there are no secret messages of Jesus and no conspiracies. There also was much faith in the early Church in the purity of the apostolic teaching, and thus St. Polycarp was highly regarded at Rome, because he had been instructed by St. John the Evangelist. Thus, apostolic succession chiefly lies in the continuation of the apostolic teaching through the relationship of teacher to student.
2. But we cannot deny the traditional and more mystical connection through the laying on of hands for the purpose of installation into the various orders of ministry, for we hear of the seven sons of Sceva in Acts 19, who attempted to exorcize “in the name of Jesus, who Paul proclaims.” The demon recognizes the crusher of the adder and the least of the apostles, but he sees no relationship between them and those who adjure him. Apostolic succession is a means whereby we are subtly marked to bind and to loosen the world, but we recognize that some are marked differently and more powerfully than others: some to be deacons, some to be priests, and others bishops. And these last are said to bear the fullness of the apostolic office by being both chief teacher and the “magic hands” who bless the oil whereby we are “marked as Christ’s own forever,” who empower us with the Spirit for service, and who set some apart as servants of the servants of God.
3. Apostolic succession is not a matter of stud books or mandates but sound teaching, faithful learning, and the intimacy of the sacred rites whereby these things are signified and made manifest to the inimical powers.


On catholicity
1. I’ve been reading a very many things lately that assert that catholicity consists in greater universality, whether by inclusion of the marginalized in civil or ecclesiastical society or by respect for the opinions of distant pilgrims in the affairs of the local assembly. To some extent, catholicity comprehends both ideas, but the general invocation of greater universality of believers as a principle might not be recognized easily by the Fathers, unless I am much mistaken.
2. Eschatologically, catholicity is all about Revelation 6:9.
3. St. Irenaeus said, “Where there is a bishop, let there be the whole multitude; just as where Jesus Christ is, there too is the Catholic Church.” (Epistle to the Smyrnaeans, 8:2). And if you actually read the Epistle to the Smyrnaeans, you realize that Irenaeus’s specific point concerns the necessity of the bishop’s presence at the Eucharist and other sacraments. But his point in general is as the context suggests: the principal mark of catholicity is the Real Presence of Christ Jesus in the Eucharist.
4. Marcion had bishops and dioceses throughout the Empire, but the faith he taught did not comprehend the revelation to the Israel nor the veracity of the Christ as fully human and divine creator and savior, and thus fully comprehensive of the entire created order and the salvation from sins, as St. Cyril of Jerusalem said in his Catechism (18:23), though in general and not specifically about Marcion. And likewise Arius etc. Thus, a mark of catholicity is the veracity, transparency, relevance, and completeness of teaching. St. Augustine emphasizes transparency greatly in City of God . Thus, we must agree with Luther and the Articulators in particular that “The visible Church of Christ [is where] the pure Word of God is preached, and the Sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ’s ordinance…” for if those things are true, such a Church is the church catholic.
5. If you’re worshipping the Lamb, it’s really hard to see how you could be any more catholic.
6. The catholic Creeds thus are chiefly catholic because of what they say, not because of the circumstances under which they were drafted or promulgated or on account of the merits of the bishops who first assented to them. This should make all students of ecclesiastical history feel better.
7. The Vincentian Canon is not a principle of catholicity, because it, after all, was first used to argue against St. Augustine of Hippo. It fails by irony. It’s vaguely like arguing against the Petrine Doctrine by using Galatians.



On reformation
1. The church always should be reformed. Hmm…I’ve seen that somewhere before.
2. No matter what, Christ is not fully incarnate among us, nor do we teach the fullness of those things that bring abundant life and salvation.
3. Thus, the church should direct its reform toward incarnation of Christ and veracity of teaching.
4. Reformation is not a matter solely of church councils or vestry meetings; it is not a matter of liturgy tweaks or mission trips; it is not achieved by reckless denunciation of the old or equally reckless denunciation of the new, nor by their embrace with total abandon. No, reformation begins with the conversion of the individual soul to the upbuilding of the Body. At its root, it is what we do when we bring the fruits of our labor to the altar and join in the Eucharistic Feast, where we ourselves are epicleted, “Sanctify us also that we may worthily receive…” It is when we seek to become living stones of a holy temple. If we ever think that we are reformed by votes or budgets or missives of praemunires from across the sea and not by the physician of our souls, we are in serious trouble. There is a discipline of holy living in which I greatly fall short, but I see how it could be and thus dimly envision the perpetual reformation of the Bride of Christ, Holy Mother Church.

Until next time, the Holy Brothers pray that you may venerate the sacred Mysteries of Christ’s Body and Blood and evermore perceive within yourselves the fruit of your redemption. Amen.