AEF Conference: Ready to Begin

With only 1 hour to go until the AEF Call Conference begins, I thought I'd give you a sneek peek at a Focus Paper by Hans Boersma that will be used tonight as somewhat of a springboard to set the stage (so to speak) for the three days of talks and discussions that will follow.

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A Call to an Ancient Evangelical Future -- Focus Paper
by Hans Boersma

The purpose of this focus paper is to assist us in our discussions of the various presentations to which we will be listening.  Our purpose, after all, is not to embrace the idiosyncrasies of individual speakers, but to explore together the potential that the Call to an Ancient Evangelical Future holds.  To that end, I am going to ask you to listen to each of the presentations through the lens of eight questions, and to keep these questions in mind throughout our discussions.  These questions will keep us close to the heart of what this Call is meant to convey and to promote.

1. Metanarrative
The Call comes at a time in which we as evangelicals -- along with Western culture more broadly speaking -- are coming to grips both with challenges to modern rational foundationalism and with a lapse into a postmodern pragmatism that gives up on the very possibility of a single normative narration. Faced with both of these challenges, the Call raises the pressing question: "Who gets to narrate the world?"  In a postmodern context, the Call affirms unapologetically that the Church has a metanarrative, namely, the "divinely authorized canonical story of the triune God."  In light of these continuing rationalist influence in evangelicalism, the Call cautions against the reduction of the gospel to "mere propositions" and to "business models" of the Church.  So, the question we want to ask ourselves throughout is the following: Does this affirm the possibility of a distinctly Christian matanarrative?

2.  Ressourcement of the early Church
A second pillar to the Call is the word "ancient" in "Ancient Evangelical Future."  The Call explictly calls us back to the fifth-century Vincentian Canon, "the tradition that has been believed everywhere, always, and by all."  It will be clear from the Call's consistent interaction with contemporary challenges that this call toward the Tradition of the Church is not meant as a wooden traditionalism.. At the same time, we recognize that it is the early Fathers who gave us the historic forms of Word and sacrament, the Christian year, catechetical spiritual formation, as well as ascetic practices of cruciform holiness.  Ressourcement of the Tradition will take the early Church's Rule of Faith as its starting-point and will have as one of its primary concerns theology as an authentic outworking of the consensus of the undivided Church.  We ask ourselves, therefore: Are we genuinely looking to the early Church for ressourcement?

3. Spiritual interpretation
The Scriptures are not purely historical documents of interest to detached, individual observers; nor are they an excuse for a strictly therapeutic application to our personal narcissistic concerns. In line with the tradition of the Church, the Call insists on what St. Irenaeus calls "recapitulation" as a principle to guide our interpretation of the Scriptures.  Since Christ's work of redemption recapitulates the Old Testament narrative, all the Scriptures are to be read in the light of his Incarnation and within the context of the Church's creeds.  The early Church's typological reading of Scripture -- pointing to the Church, her mission, and her eternal future -- was the means by which people could place themselves squarely within the redemptive mission of Jesus Christ.  Here we ask the question: are we reading the scriptures with spiritual lenses?

4.  Visible Church

Few things have been as detrimental to the cause of the Christian faith as the disunity of believers.  Evangelicals have too easily accepted the notion of an invisible Church at the expense of the call to visible unity.  The Call, therefore, asks us to take seriously the ecumentical implications of the Nicene Creed's confession of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church.  In line both with our ressourcement of the tradition and this emphasis on the visible Church, we are calling for a renewed appreciation of the sacramental character of reality.  The sacraments of Baptism and Eucharist initiate us into the visible Church of Jesus Christ, a reality that we dare not circumvent with individualist approaches to the Christian faith.  These practices, as well as others -- confession, apostolic ministry, and other charisms of the Spirit -- are the reality that give shape to the visibility of the Church.  We ask, therefore: how seriously are we taking the visible Church and the sacraments?

5.  the role of theology

Particularly sensitive among evangelicals, considering the centrality we have given to the Word, is the role of theology.  While the Call doesn't reject the obvious need for propositions as such, we do insist that God is not "a mere object of the intellect" but is instead the source and final purpose of our lives.  Theology, therefore, is not just a science but also provides wisdom.  If theology is -- as it was for the Church Fathers -- the results of theological or spiritual interpretation of Scripture, then it wil lead to ecclesial lives, the moral contents of which gets shaped by the gospel rather than by secular cultural narratives.  We'll ask ourselves the question, therefore: are we viewing theology as a spiritual discipline that returns us to the life of the triune God?

6. Christian morality

The Call ends with a comment on the Church's embodied life in the world.  Both modern rationalism and postmodern relativism make it difficult for Christians to express their faith commitment in our everyday lives.  But we dare not simply blame our cultureal context.  If the Scriptures interpret us more than we interpret the Scriptures, then surely the Call is right to ask us to affirm a culture of life, to uphold biblical morality, and to engage in practices of self-denial.  If disciples are not greater than their master, then cruciform holiness is the way for us to recover our counter-cultural mission to the world, as the Call puts it.  For the Church Fathers, the virtuous life was the way for spiritual interpretation to lead to further union with God and with one another.  Here, the question is: are we calling for bold moral embodiment in line with the Church's identity in Christ?

7.  Reunification of the Church

Finally, it is our deep conviction that if all of us -- Orthodox, Catholics, and Protestants -- take the early Church's metanarrative as our starting-point, if we read the Scriptures with spiritual lenses and in the context of the visible Church, our theology will give reliable guideance for the future of evangelicalism. When asked about "separatist ecclesiologies," Bob Webber recently alluded to Philip Schaff in making the comment: "The Protestant world left the Catholic Church for a correction.  Once that correction has been made, [Schaff] said, we should reunite again with the Catholic Church."  The agenda of the Call is not an accomodation either to modernity or to postmodernity.  Instead, it provides a counter-cultural agenda aimed squarely at reunification with Rome and with Orthodoxy.  Therefore, we cannot let cultural agendas detract us from the important question: are we opening up possibilities for reunification with Catholicism and Orthodoxy?

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*my apologies for any typos I may have made in reproducing this document here for you to read.  -- Chris Monroe

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Comments

[Dana Ames]

Ooooh boy.... good stuff. Hope your fingers stay warm :) Thanks so much for blogging this!
Dana

[Chris Monroe]

Dana,
So far...my fingers are still working. One of the big challenges will be to maintain my "focus" on the discussion here, and not get too distracted with my blogging. My first priority is to be part of this conversation. Blogging comes after that (but it's a close second). :D

- Chris

[Sivin]

great that you are covering this event. I recall that's your strength the last time I followed you through an emergent convention! :-)

[Chris Monroe]

Sivin,

Ahhh, the Emergent Conventions -- some of my all-time favorite memories. Thank you for your kind words. And I'll try to live up to my reputation! ;)

Blessings,

Chris