As this issue goes to press, the Episcopal Church is reluctantly trying one of its bishops (who flagrantly ordained a practicing homosexual) for heresy. Already, the trial has been delayed by procedural moves, including changes of venue and a call for a preliminary hearing on whether the Episcopal Church even has a doctrine that addresses the bishop’s alleged misconduct and the false teaching on which it was based. If the court decides there is no such doctrine, the heresy trial will be aborted.
Excesses elicit correctives. Each new imbalanced approach to the faith gives the church the fresh opportunity to demonstrate the fine, subtle equilibrium of faith that makes it beautiful. Heresy occurs where some legitimate dimension of faith is so weighted out of equilibrium as to become a principle of interpretation for all other aspects, thus denying the unity and proportionality of the ancient always-everywhere-and-by-everyone consensus.
God allows heresies to challenge the church in order to bring us to a fuller understanding of the truth. We hope the Episcopal Church will discover that.
HUNTING FOR HERESY
The Greek word behind heresy means the act of choosing: the self-willing choice that departs from apostolic teaching. Marcion, Montanus, and Arius were all convinced they had a clearer picture. The current error does not proclaim a better truth, but that all truths are equal and none is superior. The old-time heretic had excessive regard for his own “truth.” Nevertheless, the modern relativist may be every bit as willful in considering all truths “valid.” Thus the difficulty for someone who wants to discuss heresy.
I have had the dubious honor of being tagged a heresy-hunter. I first considered calling myself a victim, an abused truth-seeker. Instead I have embraced heresy-hunter in an ironic sense: I am looking for some church discussion, even a bull session, in which heresy exists, at least in theory.
Today, the archheresiarch is the one who hints that some distinction might be needed between truth and falsehood, right and wrong. This is often treated incredulously by a relativist majority.
Oldline Protestantism at its tolerant and vulnerable zenith finally achieved what inquisitors and crusaders could not: the eradication of heresy. No heresy of any kind any longer exists within this pliable, smiling ecclesial ethos–except, perhaps, for offenses against inclusivism.
After centuries of struggle with the truth, heresy has finally been banished from the doctrinally experimental inclusive church. This unprecedented accomplishment is an ironic twist on the conservative search for the purity of the church: Rather than separate itself from the sinful and heterodox, the church now simply excludes sin and heresy from consideration.
Sadly, there is no way even to raise the question of where the boundaries of legitimate Christian belief lie when absolute relativism holds sway.
ABSOLUTE RELATIVISM
To proclaim generously that anyone’s truth is as valid as anyone else’s truth is to deny the existence of truth altogether. The early church could not proclaim its message without distinguishing that message from other messages. It is only when we begin to have the courage to specify the things that are not the faith clearly that our affirmations can be taken seriously.
It was not until Athanasius ruled out Arian excesses that he became a serviceable theologian. It was only when Luther said no to indulgences that he became a Reformer. Today the confession that Jesus Christ is Lord requires a decisive repudiation of views that demean the atoning work of God the Son. The worshiping community cannot in the name of inclusiveness honestly allow the implication that the salvation accomplished once for all on the cross is one among many salvations.
There is a fantasy abroad that the Christian community can have a center without a circumference. Since we gather around Jesus, it is argued, it is our center, not our boundaries, that matter. But this is the persistent illusion of compulsive hypertolerationism. A community with no boundaries can neither have a center nor be a community.
A center without a circumference is a dot, nothing more. Without boundaries, a circle is not a circle. The circle of faith cannot identify its center without recognizing its margins. The debate about whether heresy can be defined is a struggle to specify margins, the legitimate boundaries of the worshiping community.
The rediscovery of boundaries will be the preoccupation of twenty-first century theology. Some cannot imagine any boundary-making work without becoming anxious. They recount the sins of the last five centuries: a history that left many dead and wounded. Rather than fixate on these last five centuries, we should instead reexamine the first five centuries, a time of flourishing consensus, as evidenced in the seven Ecumenical Councils and the most widely regarded Doctors of the Church venerated East and West.
Some think that specifying boundaries at all will be tainted by hubris and splattered with blood. The apostolic faith has learned under the guidance of the Spirit that when the boundaries are accurately stated, conflict and hubris are tamed and purified.
By Thomas C. Oden, professor of theology and ethics, Drew University. Oden is the author of “Requiem: A Lament in Three Movements” (Abingdon).
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