Posted on 01/07/2006 8:11:15 AM PST by jude24
Isn't that what Alamo-Girl said?
Indeed. And it is nice to see it so plainly stated! Thank you for your post!
The better model for the relationship -- unfortunately not how Catholics have typically phrased it since the Reformation (because they have tended to adopt some of the presuppositions of their Protestant opponents) -- but still the better model, IMO, is an "onion" relationship.
That is, it isn't "Scripture and tradition" but an understanding of Scripture as the central part of tradition, the part that is so important that it was committed to paper under inspiration during the lifetimes of the Apostles (in the case of the NT).
That's the center of the onion. The layers surrounding it is how the Church has understood that revelation and the consequences of it since the close of the Apostolic age.
The whole thing is "tradition," including the kernel of tradition that we call "Scripture".
The Catechism is the definitive source for the doctrines of the Church, not the Catholic Encyclopedia. If you want an answer, you have to go to the right source.
I agree fully that serious doctrinal difference exist between Catholics and Evangelical Protestants. So does Hochschild. He does not want to paper over those issues. But that was not at issue in the dispute and neither is medieval philosophy. There is no "Evangelical Protestant" version of medieval philosophy. So to claim that Wheaton needs evangelical Protestants teaching medieval philosophy in order to ensure an Evangelical Protestant take on medieval philosophy only shows that one is not serious about medieval philosophy.
Besides, that was not the issue. The issue is whether Catholics can be evangelical in their doctrine. The way Wheaton defined evangelical it did not include a single specifically Protestant doctrine, largely because Protestants disagree over all of the distinctively Protestant doctrines about church authority, sacraments etc. So by Wheaton's own definition, evangelical Catholics would fit. Since their own definition was defective, they created an extra-scriptural interpretation of their written document that adds requirements different from those under which Hocschild was hired. That's the argument: can they change the rules after hiring him on the basis of his assent to the written document and tell him that he no longer can assent to the document? Can someone else tell you that you cannot affix your signature to a statement because they know better than you what you believe? That's the issue.
Note that the Wheaton doctrinal statement (which I posted in no. 94 of this thread) does not state "alone."
"WE BELIEVE that God has revealed Himself and His truth in the created order, in the Scriptures, and supremely in Jesus Christ; and that the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments are verbally inspired by God and inerrant in the original writing, so that they are fully trustworthy and of supreme and final authority in all they say."
It says merely that the Scriptures are the final authority. This is a crucial omission. And they had to leave out "alone" because Lutherans and even Presbyterians and certainly Episcopalians do not believe in "nuda scriptura" but in fact acknowledge that they have authoritative traditions by which they interpret Scripture while all other Protestants have similar authoritative traditions (so does Wheaton College, namely this statement of faith) but do not acknowledge that they do.
So, the way the statement is worded, it is fully consonant with the Catholic Catechism. It is in fact directed at liberal Protestants who do not believe the Bible is infallible. Catholics do believe it is infallible and they can fully affirm this statement, though they'd normally choose a different word than "inerrant."
Except that through mid-evil philosophy many of the traditions of the catholic church were born and the catholics give considerable weight to tradition. It is through many of the same philosophies that the reformation shapers were motivated.
Besides, that was not the issue. The issue is whether Catholics can be evangelical in their doctrine.
Not without dismissing a good deal of catholic doctrine
Can someone else tell you that you cannot affix your signature to a statement because they know better than you what you believe?
Catholics have set doctrine, if he is a professing, practicing catholic either he subscribes to it or he ignores it. In either case that is not a good fit..
Yep, you're right.
Dear friend, you really don't know what you are talking about. Medieval philosophy is background for both Protestants and Catholics alike. Indeed, during the 1600s and 1700s what scholars call "Protestant Scholasticism" flourished among both Lutherans and Calvinists. One cannot understand Jonathan Edwards or the Puritan divines of New England without knowing Francois Turretin, the Genevan Calvinst Protestant Scholastic. Duns Scotus was widely used by Protestants. Why? Because these medieval philosophers developed great expertise in logic and analytical thinking. They are still studied for that reason by modern philosophers, secular, Protestant, and Catholic alike.
Incidentally, the same holds for Catholic medieval mystical theology. It was a wellspring for the very pietism out of which Protestant evangelicalism emerged in the 1700s and 1800s. The direct ancestors of Wheaton College evangelicals read Jean Gerson and Bernard of Clairvaux and Johann Tauler and Thomas a Kempis. They had no problem absorbing their deep insights into the Christian faith because they were Catholic authors.
The traditions of the Catholic faith on which Protestants and Catholics differ were not born in the Middle Ages but were present during the very earliest centuries of the Church. That you think all the bad stuff comes from the Middle Ages only shows how little you know about the history of theology. Intelligent Evangelical Protestants know differently and have always studied and taught medieval Catholic authors. While one could argue that medieval theology taught by a Catholic would be different from medieval theology taught by a Protestant, if a Protestant teaches medieval philosophy with a Protestant twist then he is being a poor scholar. And a genuine scholar-Protestant teaching medieval theology would do his best to understand it as it was understood by its proponents, which is exactly what a true Catholic scholar would do. So to argue that a Catholic would teach medieval theology in a "catholic" way and poison the minds of Protestant students is to admit that one doesn't really want medieval philosophy taught for its own sake but wants to prostitute it to one's ecclesial aims. That's not the mark of a "Harvard of the Evangelical World," and Wheaton should be ashamed for having church-politicized this issue.
I went on to state that the main issue was whether Catholics are evangelical or whether "evangelical" only applies to Protestants. Your reply shows that you don't understand the history of the term or the history of the Evangelical (capital E) movement. You effectively say that Catholics cannot be evangelical because they'd have to dismiss a lot of Catholic doctrine. So you are accusing us Catholics of betraying the Gospel.
Now, if by that you meant our beliefs about sacraments or bishops or councils, it would be an honest difference of conviction. But did you read the Wheaton statement defining what evangelicalism is? Please pay attention: thta statement does not include a single word that opposes Catholic beliefs.
It is in fact not a very good definition of the historical Evangelical Movement. If I were asked to write a statement defining Evangelicalism (capital E) I would have added precisely the points that are specific to Evangelical Protestants and that contradict Catholic teachings. But Wheaton College did not include those points in its own self-definition. They wrote a statement that defines evangelical with a small e, not the historic Evangelical Protestant movement. They left out every single clearly Protestant distinctive. If you had read my other posts on this thread you would know why: if they had defined historical Evangelical Protestantism they would have excluded Lutherans, Methodists, many Presbyterians, Dutch Reformed, Christian Reformed, Episcopalians. They would have still been open to more than half of their constituency but they would have defined away the rest.
Intra-Protestant disputes required that this statement be very fuzzy. I'm sure the framers of it did not realize it, but by writing it so fuzzy as to make it signable by everyone from Pentecostals to Episcopalians to Lutherans to Independent Baptists, they also made it signable by evangelical Catholics, John Paul II Catholics, Catechism of the Catholic Church Catholics, Vatican II Catholics, even by Council of Trent Catholics.
All was well as long as no Catholic dared to speak up and, "Hey, I can sign that statement with no reservations." When he did, they backpedaled and added some mumbo-jumbo about how the Wheaton tradition (unwritten) needs to govern the proper interpretation of the document. They saw this coming a few years ago and developed a few "update" patch kits for it and Dr. Litfin included a statement excluding Catholics in his 2004 book--but note that that's after the hiring of Hochschild brought attention to how vulnerable the written document was.
You might want to read the WSJ article and the other postings on this thread before being so sure you know it all.
Those reading this thread might go to
http://catholica.pontifications.net/?p=1322#comments for a summary of Mark Noll's book, Is the Reformation Over? Noll's irenic approach to Evangelical Protestant and evangelical Catholics relations, although he personally remains firmly Protestant, could have been a model for the president of his own college to have followed in l'affaire Hochschild.
I read the story when it ran in the journal last Friday. It's too bad about Hochschild getting canned and having to move his family to Maryland and take a pay cut. But in a selfish way I'm kind of glad they won't be hiring Catholics. That just leaves a much higher quality of potential faculty for those of us who will be sending our kids to Catholic universities and liberal arts colleges.
I think the last line of the Journal story said something like "Wheaton may have trouble filling the position because most of the professors in Hochschild's field are Catholics." No offense Protestants, but sometimes you guys do things that make me laugh.
Dear SBprone,
To where in Maryland is he moving? Where will he be teaching (if I missed this somewhere in the current thread, my apologies)?
sitetest
I'm not sure about the name but it might have bee Mt. St. Mary's. It was a school that made him a job offer at the same time Wheaton did and he took the more prestigious offer from Wheaton. I believe it is an assistant professorship so it will set back his advancement by a couple of years and I think the salary is less than what he made at Wheaton. He probably wouldn't have any trouble getting hired at Notre Dame or Villanova if they needed somebody with his particular specialty, but that doesn't happen every day.
If he doesn't jump to a more pretigious school soon it will probably be because he gets put on the fast track at the school he's at.
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