Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus – Outside the Church there is no Salvation

The Latin phrase Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus means: “Outside the Church there is no salvation“. This expression comes from the writings of Saint Cyprian of Carthage, a bishop of the third century. The axiom is often used as short-hand for the doctrine, upheld by both the Eastern Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church, that the Church is absolutely necessary for salvation (cf. “one true faith“). The theological basis for this doctrine is founded on the beliefs that (1) Jesus Christ personally established the one Church; and (2) the Church serves as the means by which the graces won by Christ are communicated to believers.

sourch: wikipedia - Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus

I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one for whom this sounds somewhat strange.

• Firstly, any New Testament scholar, and many critical readers of the New Testament, will tell you that Jesus did not personally establish the church. He did not start a new faith either.
• Secondly, the idea that the church serve as the means by which grace is won obviously won’t hold ground if the first foundation doesn’t hold ground.
• However, to be honest, most of us probably had to change our minds because we had friends who simply don’t attend church. These doctrines won’t hold in a post-Christondom environment, because the concept of “church” and it’s place in society has changed completely.

The environment within which these doctrines developed worked with this structure:

God

|

Church

|

King and Nobles

|

People

|

Animals, Plants, and Objects

But this has changed. Or so we would think.

Andrew Root has done a brilliant study on how we made the relationships of relational youth minitry an end to a means, the end being getting kids into heaven. But getting kids into heaven doesn’t even seem enough of an end anymore. We gotta get them into church. So even though we talk about missional churches all the time, we structure entire youth ministries around getting kids into church. Yeah, they do short-term outreaches and community projects, but in the end we add these to a growing list of “church-stuff” that our kids have done.

If our entire youth ministry goes about to get the next generation into church, aren’t we then still holding to “Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus”? If we measure our success against how many kids we got to church how frequently, what is the theological presupposition underlying that?

demilitarizing the kingdom of God

A few needed thoughts on the kingdom of God by Gerd Theissen in The Religion of the Earliest Churches:

This myth (the kingdom of God) is simply consistent Jewish monotheism: God will finally be the one and only God, alongside whom there will no longer be any other powers to limit his rule …

In Judaism this includes the rule of the one and only God. Now Jesus combines this talk of the kingly rule of God, i.e. a political metaphor, with a second, family, metaphor: the image of God as father…

It is striking that Jesus always speaks only of the kingdom of God, of God’s basileia as an objective entity, but never of God as ‘king’, of basileus as a personal role. This produces a void for him which he fills with the metaphor of father: in God’s kingly rue God comes to power not as ‘king’ but as ‘father’. As familia dei, the ‘family of God’, his sons and daughters have a privileged relationship to him and take part in his rule. Therefore in the Our Father the central message of Jesus is summed up as ‘Our Father, your kingdom come… ‘ In every respect this message is this a revitalization of the Jewish sign world in the light of two basic metaphors which come into the centre. However, for Jesus this ‘myth’ of the coming kingly rule of the Father takes a form which is characterized by two special features. In both cases the mythical world is extended or transformed in a unique way: by a historicizing, poeticizing and ‘demilitarizing’ of myth.

Just a note, when Theissen refer to Jewish thoughts, he specifically do not refer to Pharasaic thought.

Second note. Maybe this demilitarization of the kingdom of God need to be kept in mind when modern metaphors for the kingdom of God is looked for.

McKnight on conversion theory and deconversion

Scot McKnight is visiting South Africa again. It’s been just over a year since last time he visited. Running a search on “McKnight” on my blog revealed some interesting things on how the emerging church scene changed since then, and Scot’s role in this from my perspective. I gave him an article David Bosch wrote about 25 years ago partly in response to the Lausanne Covenent today, and on it thanked him for the role he plays in keeping different voices together. I really respect the way in which he talks about some of the voices he differs with in private conversations.

Last night he talked with our church council on the Blue Parakeet, and I’m kicking myself for not video-taping it. Afterwards we had dinner together. Today he talked on conversion, and from tomorrow we’ll be discussing acts with him.

I’m not going to try and repeat all that was said, but this is the image that we used in the discussion:

Conversion is this process of moving from the context where you are to the “church”, the group where are are moving towards. This may be a megachurch or small group meeting somewhere that won’t ever call themselves church. Conversion is changing my story to be told through the lens of this new self understanding I now have, which is formed by this group.

Part of converting is a crisis that is addressed. For years now I’ve been getting more and more uncomfortable with the fact that we have been creating a crisis in our attempts of evangelism. This crisis have usually been by painting a vivid picture of how someone might just burn in hell, or in lighter forms convincing someone of the severity of his/her sins, and this warthful God that really cannot help but punish us, that is of course just. Scot mentioned Brian Mclaren’s moral question: How can a just God punish a lifetime of sins with eternal torment?

But what Scot was actually talking about in the end was how people deconvert from Christianity, how people become non-Christians. What is the crisis moments that lead to this?

In his book Finding Faith Loosing Faith he talks about a number of crisis that leads to deconversion. I’ll order the book sometime, and will mention them more when I get the book, but form today’s talk Scot confirmed one thing: Fundamentalism creates extremely good soil for atheism to flourish in. I’ve been saying this for a long time now. The crisis that fundamentalism creates is that an expectation on infallability of the Bible is created that cannot be met, and the text never intended to meet, when that realisation dawn on someone, it has the potential of leading to atheism.

Of course there are other reasons for deconverstion as well. But I’ll skip them for now. This is a model that I believe I’ll use again, and would love to know more about.

a story on belief and reality

I’m reading The Song of the Bird by Anthony de Mello which Cori and Kevin gave us for our wedding. The following story de Mello wrote explains a lot of my own struggle with religion, faith and church. But it’s a story, so you decide what it mean for you:

Nasruddin is Dead

Nasruddin was in a philosophical frame of mind: “Life and death-who can say what they are?” His wife, who was busy in the kitchen, overheard him and said, “You men are all alike-quite unpractical. Anyone can tell that when a man’s extremities are rigid and cold, he is dead.”

Nasruddin was impressed by his wife’s practical wisdom. Once when he was out in the winter snow, he felt his hands and feet go numb. “I must be dead,” he thought. Then came a further thought: “What am I doing walking around it I am dead? I should be lying down like a normal corpse.” Which is just what he did.

An hour later, a group of travelers, finding him by the roadside, begad to argue whether he was alive or dead. Nasruddin yearned to cry out, “You fools, can’t you see my extremities are cold and rigid?” But he knew better than to say that, for corpses do not talk.

The travelers finally concluded he was dead, and hoisted the corpse onto their shoulders with a view to carrying it to the cemetery for burial. They hadn’t gone far when they came to a forking of the ways. A fresh dispute arose among them as to which road led to the cemetery. Nasruddin put up with this for as long as he could. Then he sat up and said, “Excuse me, gentlemen, but the road that leads to the cemetery is the one to your left. I know that corpses do not speak, but I have broken the rule this once and I assure you it will not happen again.”

When reality clashes with a rigidly held belief, reality is generally the loser.

Well, you interpret the story. I’ll keep on telling it for some time I think, because it so beautifully sums up my feelings on so many things I find in the way people approach religion, faith and church.

reading Transforming Mission

Arthur asked whether I’d create a space where Transforming Mission, te well-known book by David Bosch, can be discussed, and starting in a few weeks, this will happen. The group will be joined by myself, and maybe one or two other young pastors from our denomination, some friends from TGIF, some friends from Nieucomminuties, and Annemie Bosch, the wife of David Bosch.

Hopefully we’ll start in the week of 9-13 March, although we still need to find a day that would fit everyone, and then get together every second or third week. I’ll be blogging on this as the discussion go on, and invite all who cannot physically join us, to join us in blogging about Transforming Mission. I’ll blog about some updates on what we’ll be reading, and sometimes some info that might be important when reading as well. So here is the first mail I sent out last night:

OK, so now that everyone is back in SA, it might be time to get digging into Transforming Mission.

I suggest we get together during the day, morning or afternoon, rather than evenings. Let me suggest Wednesday mornings, starting on March 11. Let me know if this won’t work for you. I’m happy with doing a weekly thing if everybody is up for it, but maybe getting together every second or third week might be better for those who are already highly committed at other places (which is everyone).

Lesslie Newbigin described Transforming Mission as a Summa Missiologica.

“It has been said that “any missiology can only be done as a footnote to the work of David Bosch” (Bevans & Schroeder 2005:69), making it analogous to the words of Albert the Great which were spoken at the funeral of Thomas Aquinas, that theology after Aquinas will be only a footnote to his work After the death of Bosch, König (1993) described him as probably the greatest theologian ever to come out of South Africa, particularly where scientific theology is concerned.”

I believe that at least three academic fields/qualities come together within Transforming Mission. Bosch as historian, Biblical scholar, and missiologist. It was the combination of these three (at least) that made the writing of this work possible.

For the first discussion, read the Introduction and Chapter 1. The significance of starting in this way shouldn’t be overlooked. It’s not neccesarily obvious. Looking at Jesus and the early church before describing three different “missiologies” from within the New Testament open some windows into the approach Bosch used at other times as well. Of special significance in understanding Bosch (although you might well differ from me in my highlighting of this one aspect above the rest) might be the long quote from Schweizer on page 47. His own words after this quote was: “In all our discussions about Jesus’ mission we should keep this perspective in mind”. Read the chapter, let’s discuss the significance of this.

To attempt and get a grip on the work, I’d suggest you take a look at the three short chapters: Five, Eleven and Thirteen.

The subtitle of the book “Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission”, might have more than one meaning, but one of them would be the fact that Bosch works with paradigm theory, consider a paradigm shift to be under way, and attempts to point a way forward for mission within this emerging paradigm (used long before the emerging church got it’s name). Chapters 5 and 11 comes before and after the description of the different paradigms from the time of Jesus onwards. And would give a picture of underlies the writing of the book.

Proffesor Piet Meiring always talk about chapter 13 as “vintage Bosch”. The student of Bosch become almost frustrated at times, because you struggle to find the voice of Bosch within Transforming Mission. This summary of mission up to the end of the 80’s, foundation for the 90’s onwards, sometimes seem to hide the voice of the author. Chapter 13 provides the reader with a glimpse into Bosch’s vision of what this might mean, captured in only a few pages.

I pray that the reading of this would be much more than a mere intellectual exercise, but that it would be a spiritual journey of discovering the life with Christ which calls us to be part of the mission of God and the church within this world.

Some questions you might consider is to try and see the tensions and similarities between Transforming Mission and your own tradition and thoughts.
The implication for the church of what we are reading.
How this relate to our current context in South Africa.
And make notes where something seem unclear. This is not the easiest book you will ever read.

Looking forward to reading this with you.

Cobus

So, if you want to blog on the Introduction and Chapter 1 within the next few weeks, that will be a great way of taking part in the conversation. If you do, let me know, and I’ll link to all the posts as we go along.

a Bosch quote on tragedy and hope

“Tragedy, however – so Steiner reminds us – is by definition irreparable. We remain pawns, turned over to the capriciousness of a malevolent God, to blind fate, the solicitations of hell, or to the brute fury of our own animal blood, which is waiting for us in ambush at the crossroads, mocking us and destroying us. But Steiner also points out that we encounter tragedy in Greek antiquity and in Shakespeare, not, however, in the Judaeo-Christian Scriptures and tradition.

But I stand in this latter tradition. This means that I am an anti-tragedy person. I am in the hope business. I know of judgement, which is no the same as tragedy. I also know of repentance and forgiveness, of reparation and restitution, of a new life beyond the grave, of a kingdom that is coming. And, of course, I am not alone in this. There are also the Desmond Tutus, the Beyers Naudés and tens of thousands of others; there is still a silver-haired Alan Paton who first aroused our consciences when he wrote Cry, the Beloved Country, forty years ago, and who, just a month ago, opened out National Initiative for Reconciliation with a reading from Psalm 130. The night is dark, indeen, but there have always been and there still are the watchmen crying out their messages of hope, reminding us that when the night is at its darkest, dawn has drawn near.

From as article by David Bosch titled Afrikaner Civil Religion, in The Best of Theology Volume 1. This was written in 1985, although published in 1987.

three trends in the changing church

I’m reading Craig van Gelder’s the ministry of the missional church at the moment. Starting in chapter 1, he points to three trends in which the changing conversation about the church find expression:

The purpose-driven church: Obsessed with finding strategies to help the congregation become more effective or successful. Justified on the grounds that such strategies is necessary within the changing context, we need to remain relevant.

The emergent church: Addressing the same changing context, but doing so by trying to recapture the ethos and practices of the church of the early centuries, and to bring these to bear in within the postmodern condition. A fairly accurate summary I would say.

The missional church: Not focusing on the changes in society primarily, but rather a conversation about the nature of church. This conversation about the nature of the church is seen as necessary before talking about the purpose of the church, or how to address changing contexts.

What would emerging-missional then mean? And would you get something like purpose-driven-emerging? Or purpose-driven-missional? Is it really possible to be purely part of only one trend? Is it possible to have a pure emergent trend?