Unrecognized Love

Jonathan loved David. That's what the Bible says. They were soul-mates. The Bible does not call them "friends." It cannot be explicitly determined from the text that their love had — or didn't have — an erotic expression. The Hebrew has been heavily redacted, and the Greek and Latin amended by the excision and addition of suggestive or obfuscatory text. So while there is no explicit evidence of erotic fire there are clear signs of concerted efforts to clear the room of smoke.

All of this is irrefutable and objectivity true. Still, one of the more tiresome responses from the reasserter wing, in response to a statement such as that above, is that it somehow represents an eroticized Western culture's failing to understand the nature of friendship.* On the contrary, it is this unfounded assertion that represents a heterosexist or (at worst) homophobic culture's inability to recognize loving and devoted same-sex relationships, understanding them only in objective and erotic terms.

Even in frankly eroticized and libertine "gay cultures" gay men know the difference between their friends and lovers. Many gay men have deep, devoted, lasting friendships with other men in whom they have no erotic interest whatsoever. It is the heterosexist culture that doesn't want to ask and certainly doesn't want to be told about lifelong, monogamous, same-sex couples, — and so tries to conceal or erase or trivialize them by calling them "just good friends," or "roommates," or "war buddies who are sharing an apartment," or "bachelor girls" doing the same for purely monetary reasons. The "love that dare not speak its name" is bound and gagged by a culture that doesn't know love because it refuses to see it, and is afraid to acknowledge it.

This has been going on for over three thousand years, and it is about time to stop.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

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*An example, from the recent "traditionalist" paper written for the House of Bishops (page 11 in the draft version), in reference to any suggestion of a same-sex relationship between David and Jonathan.:

Here there is the obvious difficulty of arguing from an agenda rather than from explicit textual support. But it also exposes the weakness of modern western culture in not being able to foster or even understand deeply committed same-sex friendships that do not involve physical sexual expression.

Of course, this is precisely not a matter of an "agenda" (other than the heterosexist agenda to maximize Scriptural negativity towards same-sex relationships while minimizing anything positive); and the nature of the relationship as based on "love" rather than "friendship" is explicit in the text. If one were to change the names and recast the story with a man and woman, no one would argue it was about "very good friends." In fact, one need not engage in such speculation, since the same Hebrew verb for "love" of David is used in the same chapter (1 Samuel 18) in reference both to Saul's son Jonathan and his daughter Michal. David would later make it clear that the former was a more wonderful and greater love, in a text bowdlerized in the Vulgate.

Update 6/2/10: The thinking continues in part 2.

Thought for 05.25.10

Worship without mission is precious at best and scandalous at worst.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

And, btw, I disagree with those who cleverly turn the phrase around and harp on "mission without worship." We have it on good authority that a deed of kindness and love done to others, even in total ignorance that they are "Jesus in disguise" will not go without its recognition. Mission to the poor and outcast is worship, for in serving them we serve Jesus. And this from a liturgist!

The Just Judge and Us

The story of the woman taken in adultery is often cited when people are talking about the church’s responsibility to offer discernment, or even judgment, in spite of Jesus’ explicit command not to judge (Mt 7.1, Lk 6.37). It is true that this story is often misused from the liberal end of the spectrum, and people forget the final line, “Go, and do not be sinning any more.” Let us not, however, omit a crucial part of the story. After all the accusers slink away, “condemned in their own consciences” as some versions say, Jesus says to the woman, “Who has condemned you?” [i.e., Who made themselves judges over you?]. “No one,” she said. “Neither do I condemn you. Go and do not be sinning any more.”

Jesus — the only human being qualified to judge (because of Who He Is) — here refuses to judge, even in a case where guilt is clear. If he refuses to judge, how dare we presume to judge? The point of the story must be that no one who is a sinner (and all are sinners) can judge another, especially if the only sinless one, Jesus, refused to exercise that role. Jesus refuses to play the judgment game. (See also Jn 8:15-16, 12.47–49 [and 3.17–18]).

Not that he will always refuse it, nor that we will not partake in the judgment (both in the dock and on the bench). But the Judgment is reserved to the End, the Last Day. At that time, not now, Jesus and his Chosen Ones will judge the world. And his Chosen Ones include the people of Nineveh, and the Queen of the South, as well as the Apostles. (Mt 10.15, 12.41–42, 19.28; Jn 5.22-24,29, 12.48). For the time being, the world judges wrongly (Jn 16.8-11), and Jesus warns us neither to judge nor condemn on the basis of partial evidence — for until the Last Day when all is revealed, we have only partial evidence, having, as Paul says, imperfect knowledge. (Mt 7.1–5, 12.7; Luke 6.37, see also Rm 2.1–5, and Jn 7.24.)

I served jury duty over the last several weeks, and one of the instructions the judge gave at the beginning of the case was that we were to form no conclusions until we had heard all of the evidence, and then to deliberate on the basis of that evidence. (The case settled before we reached that point.)

How much better the church would be if instead of condemning and judging others we looked into our own hearts and confessed our faults (which are many) to one another, seeking the help and support of our companions in pilgrimage? And waited in patience for all to be revealed?

Here is my prayer for the church:

What kind of church we are to be? Shall it be the “O.K. Club” or “St Saviour’s Hospital”? The church of those who are at ease in Zion, or those who dwell in the exile of Babylon? Will it be the church of the Pharisee or the Publican? Of those who bind burdens, or those who liberate? The church of Caiaphas, secure in his skill, or of Cephas, who knew his failings? The church of Paul at his worst, or Paul at his best? Will it be the church of those who close the door on others, or of those who are trying to get in? Will it be the church of those for whom the Decalogue, the Summary of the Law, and the Golden Rule are not enough, or of those who know how hard it is to follow even these high standards? Will it be the church of those who are prepared to cast stones, and were condemned by their own consciences, or those whom they accuse, and whom Jesus refuses to condemn? Will it be the church of those who sit in judgment, or of those who love much, and minister to Jesus by washing his feet with their tears?

I pray our church will be a wing of St Saviour’s Hospital. There are no outpatients there, and everyone who arrives is a terminal case: they die to self, in order to rise to life everlasting. For the church is not a society of nice people who obey the rules. The church is the Body of Christ. There is no salvation in the Law. None. The Law did not and will not save us. Jesus did and will.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

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Reasonable and Holy Doubt

Recently, Reasonable and Holy has been critiqued on three grounds:

• First, that it is, as Ephraim Radner suggests, "a tissue of maybe," and hence not sufficient to make a case for change.
• Second, that while it may effectively weaken the prevailing arguments against the licitness of life-long monogamous same-sex relationships, and indeed to some extent undermine the traditional limitation of marriage to mixed-sex couples, still, it does not provide an alternative positive theology for this innovation.
• Finally, it is also suggested that the burden of proof lies on my side of the debate.

I see these grounds of complaint as related and I will try to address them in a single response. Part of this is because of the ethical understanding with which I come to the discussion. Not wishing to launch into a long essay on the various schools of ethics, let me just say that I would here espouse the ethical stand in the neighborhood of what are known as Probiliorism and Probabalism — as opposed to the more rigorous and inflexible Tutiorism. I am not alone in this, and in fact my position is the dominant model in contemporary ethics.

Tutiorism is a hard master, and requires that in any doubtful case, one must always follow the more secure or established rule unless the alternative can be shown to be so likely as to be virtually certain. In a legal context we might call that a standard of "clear and convincing" or perhaps even "beyond reasonable doubt." (Much depends on whether one is the plaintiff or the defense; bear with me!)

Probabalism and Probiliorism, respectively, require only that the alternative to following the standard rule be shown to be probable (or in the latter system, more probable) than the standard to allow for liberty. These would be something more like the legal standards of "showing reasonable doubt" or having the "preponderance of the evidence" on one's side.

I realize I'm mixing legal and ethical systems here, but I hope this helps make the distinctions clearer without bringing in too much subtle confusion. But I also do this in part because there is a forensic side to this discussion.

In short, from my perspective, some of my critics are calling for my side to provide clear and convincing evidence of innocence (or licitness) when all I believe we are required to introduce is reasonable doubt as to guilt (or illicitness). We are talking, after all, about the rightness of performing a certain action (or entering a certain estate), which the traditional side sees as a sin if not a crime. As I am on the defense side of the equation, and the burden of the "traditional" side is to show, beyond reasonable doubt, that the tradition is correct, I think I have done my job. Even Dr. Radner admits I present effective counter-arguments to much of the traditional case. In short, "maybe" is enough to cast reasonable doubt upon the air-tightness of the traditional case, and acquit those accused of improper action.

Now, when we get to the question of the church's blessing, a positive act on the church's part, the question of theology comes up. First, I must note once again that the church's teaching is that marriage exists prior to and apart from any "blessing" the church may offer. (The ministers of marriage are the couple.)

But when it comes to providing an alternative positive theology for same-sex marriage, I think my critics misunderstand me. I am not arguing for a separate theology of marriage different from the theology we already have for marriage — such as it is. (I add that proviso because any careful examination of the tradition reveals a number of variant theologies from the patristic era and up through the high middle ages and on through the Reformation. Anglicans tended in general to be closer to Luther's "a matter of the town hall" than to the Roman Catholic "sacrament," when they referred to marriage as "an estate allowed.")

However, I deliberately took the exhortation of the marriage rite in the Book of Common Prayer as my model in examining a theology for same-sex marriage. I believe I have convincingly demonstrated that procreation cannot be held to be an essential element in marriage precisely because, according to the church's teaching, marriage is not forbidden to those who cannot procreate. That would seem to me to be a simple bit of logic (i.e., something not required cannot be essential), and incontestable as it stands. I believe I have also shown that all of the other characteristic "goods" or "ends" of marriage can be shared and realized by a same-sex couple. So whatever "theology" you wish to apply to marriage — apart from one that requires the capacity to procreate as essential, in contravention of the church's tradition and law — can be applied to a same-sex as well as a mixed-sex couple.

I hope that goes a bit towards addressing these critics. And I really do wish some of them would read the book instead of relying on Dr. Radner's review.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

The Pluperfect Mindset

In response to the ordinations of two new bishops in Los Angeles yesterday, the usual suspects from the Anglican Right are atwitter with comments about further rifts or tears in the Anglican Communion, accusations that the Episcopal Church has now walked apart in some formal way from that Communion, and that it certainly can't in good conscience sign on to the Anglican Covenant (as they conceive it, in a kind of anticipatory prejudgment of exactly what the policies and objects of discipline might be down the road once the new body is actually, well, embodied.)

It is important to remember that any "rift" or "tear" or any such "transection" is at this point "a rift in the Anglican Communion" -- it is not a rift between the Anglican Communion and some entity not a part (or no longer a part, as Anglican Mainstream and others would have it) of the Anglican Communion. No one has "walked apart" from the rest of the Anglican Communion, except perhaps those portions of it, such as Nigeria and parts of GAFCON / FoCA, who have chosen actually to reject the See of Canterbury as a focal point for gathering the Anglican episcopate for consultation, or who have established separatist outposts within the confines of other Anglican jurisdictions, declaring they are out of communion with the larger body.

So much of this is based on the self-fulfilling false prophecy of those who attribute more authority to the Instruments of Communion than they have heretofore exercised, or than they have been granted by the actual member churches and provinces of the Communion. Thus, conferring and consulting bodies have been lacquered with a quick coat of putative authority, which cannot completely cover the underlying texture: these bodies are not yet in possession of the powers with which some would like to invest them.

The fact is, a number of member churches disagree on a number of issues. (What else is new?) What we can say with some historical perspective is that Lambeth has no doctrinal authority (yet!); the Primates may express an opinion; but dissenters both to the left and the right are under absolutely no obligation to follow or concur with the judgment either of the gathered bishops or the Primates. The Windsor Report contains recommendations that the provinces have yet to endorse or act upon in a definitive way — and that includes TEC as well as ACNA, both of whom have taken actions contrary to the wishes expressed in Windsor.

Those at present with their undergarments in a tangle display a very much "make it up as we go along" sort of ecclesiology, in which they act as if what they want is what already is. Unless and until some form of the Anglican Covenant is signed off on, the Anglican Communion remains a "fellowship of autonomous provinces and churches" without a central governing authority, and with, at present, some serious disagreements among its members.

Only those who agree to the proposed Covenant will be part of whatever new constellation emerges, and will presumably submit to whatever governance to which they have covenanted. But for the meantime they are living in the pluperfect, as the New Anglican Thing has not yet come to be. And much depends on who signs up. (I've said before, I'd welcome a little more structure to the Anglican Communion. Either that or clearly back to that "fellowship." It's this living in-between with made up rules and assertion and arrogation of authority not yet conferred that I find wearing, troubling and un-Christ-like.)

In the meantime, Diane and Mary are bishops in good standing in the Episcopal Church, and hence, in the Anglican Communion. They will be welcome where they are welcome, and rebuffed where they will be rebuffed: actions entirely within the competency of any diocesan bishop outside of Los Angeles.

Deal with it.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Judgment Day

Regular readers will have noticed that I have not posted, nor even done much in the way of the comments section of this blog, for the last week or so. This is because I have been called for, and am now serving, jury duty in the Bronx Supreme Court. After a day in the jury pool, my name was drawn for a panel, and as the attorneys did their winnowing, a jury of six (this is a civil case) was chosen, and then out of the remaining few possible candidates two of us were accepted as alternates. On the second day of the actual trial, one of the jurors went home for lunch break and took a nap from which he did not awake until it was too late to return to the courthouse. Then, in a moment not unlike that recorded in the first chapter of the Acts of the Apostles, the names of the two alternates, on bar-coded slips of paper, went into the spinning drum, and the lot fell on me. The case is expected to continue through most of the coming week. After which, I hope I will be able to resume blogging and commenting at a rate approaching the usual.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Purity Unrealized

Puritan movements are doomed to fail because people are not pure. Such coteries inevitably turn in upon themselves: having fondly imagined they can set themselves up as a society of the perfect, at the first sign of weakness the mob will turn on the one perceived as guilty and drive the offender out. Ultimately such a gathering is the antithesis of the Gospel, for it is based on judgment rather than forgiveness. It is also the antithesis of history, for it lives in a fantasy of realized eschatology rather than in the hope of a cooperative pilgrimage.

Because they are based on a goal incapable of realization -- a pure society with unrealizable standards, or a perverse double standard that acknowledges but cannot tolerate human imperfection -- they never cease from irascible critique, a toxic attitude by which they close themselves off from the wider world and then turn in upon, and digest, themselves.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Words Made Flesh

The website for the Continuing Indaba and Mutual Listening Process is now up on line. Some on the extremes of the church divide may well say, "What good is all this talk?" One side will say, "Delay is denial," while the other will say, "How can I converse with those with whom I disagree?"

Fortunately, there are others who know that it is in conversation with one another that we come to appreciate one another even if we continue to disagree with each other. Respect and forbearance are, after all, virtues in and of themselves — and even if we think our interlocutor may lack some other virtue, and she think the same of us, at least in continuing the conversation we are both incarnating a clear and definitive virtue between us.

More importantly, the overarching purpose for this continuing conversation is not conversion but mission: we are not out to produce Right Thinking in each other, but Right Action by and with each other — action right and righteous not simply on our own estimation but in fulfillment of the divine command to carry out the works of mercy; which we can do most effectively when we pool our resources in cooperative ventures. Thus are words made flesh, as at the first, while we were yet sinners, the Holy One deigned to come among us as our guest, and spoke with us, even in our ignorance, on the road of our pilgrimage.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Holy Ghost in the Shell

A few weeks ago I noted that the recent CGI animated version of Astro Boy had made it to cable TV and decided to watch it. I did so largely out of nostalgia for the lo-res black and white (at least as far as I was concerned, given my family’s TV at the time) version from my childhood. I was in for a surprise on many counts. For although my childish capacity may have missed them in those early viewings, the recent film had many rewards to offer an adult. The film was both funnier and far more serious than I remember the old animés being, and it is the serious part upon which I would like to reflect.

Among the serious themes were the conflict between fathers and sons, class consciousness and stratification, ecology, good and evil (no surprise there!), the use of power, and above all the question, “What does it mean to be human?” For Astro is a robot, something made not born —by the will of man but not of flesh and blood— taking his stand along with David from A.I. and their mutual progenitor Pinocchio, and their elder cousin Star Trek’s Data. All of them share the desire to be “real” — to be human, and you will pardon me if I say it is far more poignant in a child, even a CGI or animated child, than in an adult, though Data had his share of poignancy and wistful longing in pursuit of that enterprise.

Science fiction lends itself to this kind of speculation, which sometimes goes even farther afield. At a far step removed we have the fleshly efforts at anthropoesis, such as Dr. Frankenstein’s cut-and-paste Job, or his predecessor the Golem, animated to protect the ghetto. Neither of these is particularly childlike, nor successful at gaining, of even perhaps desirous of obtaining full humanity. As Dr. F’s benighted creature observes, "You live. We belong dead"; and it took only the elimination of the initial Aleph to move the Golem from animate emet (truth) to met (dead).

But even further from human likeness, I think of the tachikoma of the Japanese animé Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. These spider-like and ungainly though surprisingly agile tanks would appear to be unlikely candidates for becoming human — so they press the envelope and force the question: can these bones live? They do have the voices of children, however, which begins to suggest their kinship with their brothers Astro, David, and Pinocchio. They also give us a clue that humanity is not necessarily about the form of the body but the content of the heart, and the ability not only to reason, but to love.

For as a subplot of the series, the tachikoma appear to be developing what the author calls “a ghost” — that is, what we might call “a soul.” And in an astounding episode, three of these “machines” choose to sacrifice themselves to save one of their human co-workers (himself a partly mechanical man). The sound of those three childlike voices embodied in dangerous and weapon-wielding tanks shouting out, “We have to save Mr. Batou!” as they rush to their own destruction still brings tears to my eyes. Yeah, I’m an old softy when it comes to this humanity stuff and “greater love hath no tachikoma...” And the same sort of thing happens to Astro, with similar poignancy, in his case as part of his effort to win back his “father’s” love. Bring a hanky.

So what does it mean to be human? We all trace our lives back to that first artificial human — you know, the one God made from clay. We all sense that we are called to be more than we are, and that we are not quite finished, not quite real yet. Perhaps this is more poignant when portrayed in a child because we recognize the connection between growing up to the full stature of humanity and simply growing up. We all have growing up to do.

May we all grow up into our full reality, as children of God.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

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Reactions and Intolerance

The Global South Bigwigs are hobnobbing in Bermuda, and reflecting on the state of the church and the world. In these reflections they make frequent direct and indirect reference to some of the difficulties plaguing their provinces, which they put down to the election and consecration of Bishop Robinson of New Hampshire, and the election and yet-to-be-accomplished consecration of Mary Glasspool of Los Angeles.

However, since none of these Bigwigs are required to consent to, tolerate, or even recognize either Robinson or Glasspool — and completely within their rights to forbid them the exercise of any ecclesiastical act within their borders whatsoever — one can only observe that any difficulties they experience are a direct result not of the American bishop and bishop-to-be, but of their own opposition to them.

The spring season's resurgence in the pollen count (exacerbated this year by early heavy rains) has put me in mind of an analogy. Pollen simply is. It serves a vital function in the propagation of many beautiful and essential plant species, as well as a few which, because of the inconvenience they cause to human beings, earn the label weeds. Some people are allergic to some of these pollens. The allergy lies entirely with them. They can take measures to avoid the pollen, and there are medications they can use to limit any eye, nose, or throat irritation they experience. They can rail at the pollen for this inconvenience and discomfort — but it is they who have the problem and they also who have the means to address it: which by no means includes ridding the world of pollen, much as they might like to do so.

In all this, I am suggesting that people need to take responsibility for their own negative feelings and reactions (and reactivity), and find positive ways to deal with them. For example, in places where news of these elections and consecrations has brought the local Anglican church into disrepute in the eyes of Muslims or Free-church Protestants, it is completely within the power of the local Anglicans to distance themselves from decisions taken halfway round the world, and of which they have every right to disapprove, and every right to ignore. (Whether this will mollify militant Muslims, or pacify petulant Protestants is another matter.)

But it makes no more sense to continue to blame the Episcopal Church, or especially to raise the spectre of colonialism or imperialism — as if the Episcopal Church were forcing these other provinces to accept its decisions — than it is for a lactose-intolerant person to blame lactose for her own intolerance of it. If it bothers you, don't drink it. No one is forcing you.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Words and Music

The more I read essays from all quarters on the subject of Christian marriage, as various folks attempt (as I have myself attempted) to expound a theology (or at least a Christian anthropology) to account for this almost universal human phenomenon, the more I get the feeling that we are humming a tune for which we have forgotten the words.

While some play with distinctions between covenant and contract, I think we would do well to expend more time with words better suited to the music we sense deep within us: words like holiness and blessing, gift and grace, and above all, Love.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Saving the Papacy

It may be that the only way to save the papacy at this point is for the present pontiff to engage in the moral equivalent of the Gang nach Canossa undertaken in an earlier age towards his predecessor. It is a reversal of roles, but reversal is what repentance is all about.

If you don't know what the papacy needs saving from, check this out. It is more relevant now even than when written.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Quick Evaluation

Whatever good has come of the existence of the Anglican Communion (and I think there is much good to which to point), it has not been because of the so-called Instruments of Communion, but from the bi- and tri- and sometimes quad- and more-lateral relationships of individual provinces and national churches, and in some cases dioceses and parishes — and the Instruments have only been of positive effect when they have aided and supported those processes.

The Instruments exist to serve, not to rule.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Loser Take All

Virginia Theological Seminary has published an article by James Baker. Yes, that James Baker. I'm always wary of people who say, "I'm not an expert in X, but it seems to me..." This articles gives me no reason to lose my wariness. In it, Baker suggests something like a kind of congregational polity for handling differences of opinion in The Episcopal Church, whereby individual parishes could officially vote on things they [mostly] don't like about what the rest of the church has done through General Convention.

Why is it that proposals like this for "local option" always seem to come up when the church is moving in a progressive direction, but are shunned like the dickens when more conservative folks hold sway. Compare the appeal for the Port St. Lucie "Conscience Clause" with the ardent critique of "local option" on same-sex blessings, par example. (I'll note this doesn't seem to happen only in the church: the state provides ample evidence of similar tendencies. Maybe it is just that conservatives -- sacred or secular -- can't bear to be in the minority?)

Baker's proposal seems to me merely to formalize (and set in concrete) more or less what we already have de facto in terms of the prevailing issue, anyway (which is the issue Baker uses to frame the proposal): i.e., no parish is forced to call a gay or lesbian priest, or perform a same-sex blessing. There are many dioceses in which neither will happen for quite some time. Should the day come when parishes are actually required so to do, it will only be because in the course of time opposition has so far dwindled that any "vote" such as Baker proposes would produce the same result. Just how much does a democratic institution have to allow a local veto to joint decisions -- at least in the official and formal way Baker suggests?

In short, I think the system we have now provides for an ample degree of laissez-faire and toleration of moderate dissent without institutionalizing it, setting it in stone, and creating a Balkanized Church. And let's be frank once again: the problem isn't that a portion of Episcopalians don't like gay or lesbian bishops or couples getting blessed and don't want to have to deal with them. The problem is that a portion of Episcopalians don't want there to be any gay or lesbian clergy, far less, bishops, or same-sex marriages. They want what they want, for everyone. So it is not a question of laissez-faire not working, but the desire of a minority to have their way not just for themselves, but for the whole Episcopal Church -- and when they cannot achieve this through the canonical structures of General Convention it is a case of "loser take all."

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
begging pardon for taking off the gloves for a bit...

Thought for 04.06.10

To what extent do the exponents of Natural Law mistakenly "worship the creature rather than the creator" (Rom. 1.25) and "conform themselves to this world?" (Rom. 12.2)

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
suggesting that some should re-read Romans with an eye to Pauline irony

No To Imperium

Jesus Christ did not suffer and die for the sake of a centrally administered eccelesiastical institution. Nor was this what he conceived; quite the opposite, as he alerted his disciples to the danger of exercising authority over one another. Christ desired no Empire.

The Church, the Body of Christ, is not One because it has one central government, but because Christ himself is One Lord. He is the Head of the whole Church of which all who are joined in the One Baptism are members.

It is a terrible thing to see Anglicans even consider forsaking the hard-won liberation from heteronomous rule, in a massive retrograde motion towards that which is demonstrably dysfunctional in its present incarnation, the relic of an ancient capitulation to imperial pretense.

For it is precisely in areas of administration and discipline that big ungainly systems tend to go awry, and resist correction. Since all humans err from time to time, the surest safeguard both for limiting the extent of error and avoiding becoming too set in error is to bound the limits up to which any given authority can command submission to its rule. Diversity will not guarantee a firm or universal hold on truth (or even virtue) by all but it increases the chances that at least some will be right and righteous, rather than all stumbling and erring together.

Autonomy is not the enemy of fellowship. It is its precondition: for only the mature and independent can choose voluntarily to enter into relationships of interdependence and truly mutual submission. Otherwise it is dependence or codependency, or at its worst, tyranny or lordship of one over another, or over many.

Christ had no wish to see his Church become a shadow of some royal curia, full of intrigue and denial. Anglicans, do not trade the sublime vision of a communion of autonomous churches in fellowship for such a kingdom of shreds and patches.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

Thought for 03.31.10

Church growth in the midst of persecution is not "extraordinary." It is the norm. And that goes for churches being persecuted and doing the persecution. And in both cases the growth often has little staying power.

It's a funny old world.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG
in response to repeated unexamined praising of the "extraordinary" growth of the church in places facing persecution

The Ladder of Humility

Palm Sunday 2010 -- "He took the form of a slave..."
A sermon by Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

MP3 File

Hymn to the Virgin

Hymn to the Virgin from the Celestial Rose, from Dante's Paradiso, Canto XXXIII. Saint Bernard of Clairvaux sings:


«Vergine Madre, figlia del tuo figlio,
umile e alta più che creatura,
termine fisso d’etterno consiglio,

tu se’ colei che l’umana natura
nobilitasti sì, che ’l suo fattore
non disdegnò di farsi sua fattura.

Nel ventre tuo si raccese l’amore,
per lo cui caldo ne l’etterna pace
così è germinato questo fiore.


Translation
Virgin Mother, daughter of you Son,
Humble and high beyond creature,
Fixed limit of the eternal counsel,

You are she who so ennobled human nature
that the Creator did not disdain
to make of it his maker.

Within your womb was rekindled
the love by whose heat, in eternal peace,
thus was germinated this flower.

(The Flower is the celestial rose which is constituted from the company of saints themselves...)

This was recorded in rehearsal, the only recording I have, sadly. Sung by the Choir of St Luke in the Fields, with the cellist of the St Luke's Chamber Ensemble. William Entriken, Organist.

Pardon the poor quality of the tape.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG

MP3 File

The sheet music is available at Scribd.

Thought for 03.24.10

The Devil Prowls

While Jesus wills that the members of the church should be one, even as he and the Father are one (John 17:11), that likeness to God is not "something to be grasped at" (Phil 2:6) but is rather a gift from God. (2 Cor 5:18) We do not achieve unity, we accept it as we are reconciled to one another by God in Christ.

Otherwise, to seek on our own to become like God, we fall prey to something like the primal temptation from the Garden (Gen 3:5), though in form rather than knowledge.

Rather, let us accept that we are one in God through God, through the love which comes from God and transcends and encompasses and comprehends our divisions; not through our own machinations — and above all not through the reduction of our number in a mode of false unity by division and expulsion and judgment: the unity not of God, but of the Adversary.

Tobias Stanislas Haller BSG