The way forward, part 2: In essentials unity...


All Christians, I hope, can agree with these two propositions:


  • What is essential in Christianity are those things necessary for salvation.
  • The first-century apostolic community communicated all of those things to the church.

If we are to say, "In essentials unity, in nonessentials liberty, and in all things charity," we need a shared understanding of what is nonessential. Otherwise, the dictum has no force. Partisans for any matter can claim something is essential to them, and thus say there is no liberty on the subject. Strict Calvinists do that with their ideas about predestination. Aquinas's formulation of transubstantiation has a similar status among Catholics. As I have remarked before, both those doctrines are at best second-tier derivatives of revealed truth. Men came along after the fact with explanations about revealed truth, but did not reveal new truth in the process, though some find their doctrines to be useful explanations of what was revealed already. 

You can get to heaven if you do not agree with or even know about Calvin's ideas, and valid celebration of the Eucharist does not depend on understanding or even knowing about Aquinas's scholastic treatment of how it works.

Some Catholics may choke and sputter at that last point, but note that before Aquinas, Catholics were taking communion validly although the doctrine had not been formulated as yet. Today, the Eastern Orthodox have valid sacraments, even according to Roman Catholic standards, and decline to accept Aquinas's explanation as necessary or useful.

I pick these two to talk about, Calvin's predestination and Aquinas's transubstantiation, because they are very clear examples of no-compromise doctrines that do not deserve to be ranked as such. You can reject either or both and be saved. There are many more doctrines that some or other party in Christendom holds to be essential, but which are, like these two, derivative not seminal. 

If we take for nonessentials all things that do not pass the test of being necessary to salvation and revealed through the apostles, we do not thereby say that nonessentials have no value. There are many traditional beliefs and practices that enrich the lives and understanding of the faithful. Not all of them line up with the strict measure of being necessary and apostolic. What we should mean when we speak of nonessentials is that we agree not to go to war with one another over such things.

"In nonessentials liberty" encompasses liberty to do things you find beneficial, even if not all Christians agree with them. You can pray the rosary, speak in tongues, worship in Quakerly silence or insist on the traditional mass.  You can engage in spiritual disciplines, consult a spiritual director, join an order. Or not: Those are nonessentials, however helpful you may find them to be. "Each one should be fully convinced in his own mind."  (Rom 14:1-15:13)

Notice that you need not think all nonessentials are created equal. If you think your practices much better than other practices, you can invite other Christians to join you in them and show by your example that your ways are wholesome and beneficial. If you persuade others to your ways, that's fine: If you fail to do so, you must allow them their own views. If we approached nonessentials that way, we might make real progress in drawing believers together, by pulling one another mutually toward the best practices. We make little progress on togetherness when we draw battle lines, issue polemics, and anathematize, ridicule or despise one another, fighting over secondary questions. 



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