A bucket exercise, for the sake of genuine ecumenicity (2)

Based on our previous post, the following claims seem accurate and true:

a true church (confessionally defined) is not determined by whether elders serve for a term or a lifetime (a matter of prudence)
being Reformed (a confessional identity) does not require commitment to presuppositional apologetics (a theologoumenon, or theological opinion)
one can be a Christian (a fundamental essential), yet not believe infant baptism to be true (a confessional truth)

Recall our six buckets:

1. Essential truths, also called “fundamentals of the faith”

2. Confessional truths, explained by documents like the Three Forms of Unity or the Westminster Standards

3. Dogmatic claims—think Herman Bavinck, Louis Berkhof, Charles Hodge, B. B. Warfield

4. Theological opinions, often influenced strongly by assumptions arising in biblical studies, or in philosophy, or in logic

5. Prudential convictions, or sensible claims that seem to “fit” with one’s biblical and/or theological understanding

6. Varia

We offered the concluding observation that although necessary and helpful, this bucket analogy is also dangerous. Three dangers come to mind.

Danger 1: Some truths belong in more than one bucket.

For example, the truth about Christ’s human and divine natures belongs in buckets 1., 2., and 3., for sure. Many convictions relating to eschatology belong in buckets 3. and 4. It’s hard to imagine that convictions about a minister wearing a robe behind the pulpit could be placed any lower (i.e., be any more important) than bucket 4.

The reason this presents a danger involves two impulses. One is to elevate every aspect of a truth, or demote every aspect of a truth, to the higher or lower bucket, according to one’s personal preferences. And if placement options exist, differences of opinion are sure to arise, jeopardizing “unity in the faith.”

Danger 2: Some truths in a higher-numbered bucket require warrants or justifications that belong in a lower-numbered bucket.

I have dubbed “common grace” a theologoumenon, a theological opinion. It is not a core belief that determines whether one is a Christian, nor is it a confessional truth that distinguishes, say, Reformed from non-Reformed.

Oh, I know that some opponents of common grace, believing the issue to be confessional in nature, have sought and do seek to eradicate common grace, root and branch, from the thinking and convictions of their followers. So their justifications reach down (again, think lower-numbered buckets) all the way to important confessional convictions about absolute divine sovereignty, total depravity, election and reprobation, particular grace, and more.

My point here is that the yarn with which one knits the sock is not the sock itself. There are others who take that same yarn and using different stitches, knit an altogether different sock. Hence the category: theologoumena.

But why is this feature of the bucket analogy dangerous? Very simply because when one borrows elements from buckets 1., 2., and 3. to construct a truth-claim that belongs in none of those buckets, but belongs rather in bucket 4., very heated arguments and bloody verbal fisticuffs ensue. It’s almost as if these theologoumena-defenders need the soaring temps and searing rhetoric in inverse proportion to the validity of their claims to being . . . whatever: orthodox, classically Reformed, confessional, you pick.

Danger 3: Ecumenicity–which is the purpose of this discussion–is of different kinds and can therefore occur at different levels.

Let me enumerate five distinct ecumenical levels or intensities.

3.1 Organic ecumenicity: like human marriage (i.e., between a man and a woman), some church unions over the years lose all sense of “us v. them,” or “my people v. your people.” Rare, to be sure, when it comes to churches, but ideal and blissful.

3.2 Organizational ecumenicity: less intimate than organic ecumenicity, here’s where you still find, unto the second and third generation of those who fear, A-churches and B-churches in the same denomination. They’re joined, but the seams bulge for . . . ever.

3.3 Co-belligerence ecumenicity: this kind of ecumenicity is experienced at pro-life rallies and pro-life vigils, for example; prayers are prayed, Bible verses read, songs sung, hands held. Christians are united on the basis of what they are fighting.

3.4 Martyr ecumenicity: this kind is virtually ineffable, because it arises in the crucible of suffering oppression and martyrdom; Protestants and Roman Catholics and Orthodox share the Eucharist in a P.O.W. camp before facing a firing squad together, or refugees from various Christian traditions huddle together singing silently in celebration of a convert’s baptism.

3.5 Tip-o-the-hat ecumenicity: this is the most distant, most frigid form ecumenicity, where Christians/churches/federations acknowledge bits of shared faith and pieces of common practice. But union? Not in a million years. Some of this goes on in NAPARC today. Another term for it is faux fraternizing.

Once more, why is this feature of the bucket analogy dangerous? Because the arrangement of the buckets has so often encouraged people and churches to define themselves over against others, even in the same “family” of churches, on the basis of buckets 4., 5., and 6. This in turn allows Christians/churches/federations to rest content with the ecumenicity described as 3.5.

Next time: from buckets to circles.