The Holy Spirit in the World Today, Part 2

I have to admit, it was my first time hearing Jürgen Moltmann and it was sometimes difficult to understand what exactly he was saying. Apparently, he was translating from his own German notes. His paper, The Church in the Power of the Spirit, takes to task the Trinitarian implications for the church with a specific focus on the Spirit. He covers an amazing amount of topics in this paper from the churches in Germany during WWII to ecology. His paper is broken down into three parts: 1) the charismatic community; 2) the reconciliation of the cosmos; and 3) the three paradigms of the church. I'll summarize and offer some thoughts.

Without giving too much attention to the Spirit, I would say, Moltmann argues that the church is intrinsically pneumatological and in some sense leaves it at that. There is no mention of how the church is in the power of the Spirit until Moltmann gets to the section on the charismatic church, which is towards the end of his paper. He begins by noting, as many church historians will note, that the twentieth-century is marked as the time when the global church came more into focus and the "Christian nation" began to fade. He gives the example of parochial churches in Germany during WWII where if one went to a church service one is counted as a visitor and never a participant, it was a church for the people--to serve symbolic, never real liturgical needs. Against these parochial (Nazi-sponsored) churches arose the Confessing Church (Ger. Bekennende Kirche) which gave people the opportunity to become participants. As the Christian nation disappeared what took its place were the charismatic communities. (Note: charismatic should not be read as having to do with spiritual giftedness, but should be read as Moltmann would explain later as a 'non-hierarchical community of friends'.) For the sake of space, I'll leave off summarizing everything and leave it to you to listen to his wonderful paper.

Moltmann gives a nod to the Amish-Mennonite tradition when he says that in some sense their way of life can be understood as monastic (and be misunderstood as a retreat from this world as opposed to an alternative to this world). I mention this only because of the discussion Halden is having over at Inhabitatio Dei. While I understand the frustration that is had when people think it is cute what your particular tradition (read denomination) is doing but nevertheless themselves adopts your position. To have all traditions look the same would just make it so that one or the other is compromising something of their own for the sake of the other. This sounds nice, but each tradition will cease to be itself and no longer have the distinctions which make the Baptists Baptist and the Methodists Methodist. Every tradition would be the same and therefore there would be no tradition. There are certain things that I think every church should adopt, obviously; and being a peace-church is among them. I would advocate for unity through diversity as opposed to unity through compromise. As Halden writes, "The divisions are much deeper, much more real, and indeed must more theological than such sorts of ecclectic ecumenism of convenience tends to acknowledge." (Italics mine.)

That aside, we return to Moltmann. As mentioned above, Moltmann's definition of these charismatic communities is a community where everyone is accepted as she or he is, and where no one is higher or lower in the community strata and can contribute to said community. The theme of these churches is the Spirit in us, while in high-church it would be the Father above us and in Luther-inspired churches it would be Christ with us. These three paradigms make up the whole history of Christianity and Moltmann argues that we are currently in the first paradigm (of the Spirit). In regular Moltmannian fashion, we have a Trinitarian motto for the church that should be ours to follow: "God as Father above us, as Christ with us and as Spirit in us."

Unfortunately, the implicit pneumatology of Moltmann's eccleisology left much to be desired from this paper. I wondered how Veli-Matti Karkkainen, Amos Yong or Yolanda Pierce might have handled this subject. Even so, the paper highlighted the experience of emerging churches and charismatic churches everywhere where acceptance always comes before belief. The Spirit who lives in us is the one who makes the level playing-field. It is in these communities of the Spirit where we have brothers, sisters and comrades, where everyone is accepted and respected as image bearers of God, and where there is an end to race, age, sex and class.

The Holy Spirit in the World Today, Part 1

I am a few weeks late to be posting on the Holy Spirit and the World Today conference that took place towards the end of May, but with the semester coming to a close and graduation weeks away I could not find the time to listen to the papers being presented. However, now that all final papers are turned in, thesis accepted and commencement over, I have finally found the time to listen and comment on some of the lectures.

I started listening with what sounded like a preparatory paper given by David Ford on "Keys Issues in Pneumatology." The title alone led me to believe that this was one of the first papers given in order to create a common foundation for all those who came to listen. However, as I listened to the paper, I found this not to be true. Ford often commented on papers given by Moltmann and Williams; so listener beware: this is not the first paper given. (For the schedule see here.) Besides giving four ways in which pneumatology (and theology for that matter) should be done, Ford says that the twentieth-century has not been the greatest for pneumatology and that Spirit has often been relegated to subcategories of others theological fields. He cites creation ("the Spirit hovering over...") and the Trinity ("the Spirit being part of the Godhead") as examples where the Spirit is spoken of but not treated independently outside of those discussions. I can say of my own experience that this is true. A very good friend of mine once commented that Spirit is often treated as something read about, not lived with and this seems to be just what Ford was getting at.

The guiding principles for the four ways of theological enterprise for Ford were: wise and creative. He does not go on to define wise and creative, per se. However as one listens on, Ford shows how exactly wise and creative theology is done. 1) Retrieval of the past; 2) Engagement with Mind, Church and World; 3) Thinking; and 4) Communicating. Number 2) is where I believe Ford hits his stride. Noting that theology is not simply a mind exercise but is inherently liturgical. In the same way we think theologically we are thinking in terms of the one we worship and to whom we pray. Secondly, he says that for theology to be genuine there must be commitment to the Church. Now, it may be easy to take this several different ways, but taking this and what he said earlier about the connection between liturgy and theology, one sees that he means our theological endeavors (be they monographs or seminars) should be for the sake of the community of faith. Going along with Number 2), Ford says this:

"Theology that is not involved in worship and in prayer is not going to be Christian."

Indeed.