A Couple of Quotations on Pilgrimage

These are from The First Crusade (abridged edition), by Steven Runciman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1980):

The desire to be a pilgrim is deeply rooted in human nature.  To stand where those that we reverence once stood, to see the very sites where they were born and toiled and died, gives us a feeling of mystical contact with them and is a practical expression of our homage.  And if the great men of the world have their shrines to which their admirers come from afar, still more do men flock eagerly to those places where, they believe, the Divine has sanctified the earth.  (p. 21) 

But the journey was still sufficiently long and arduous to appeal to the common sense as well as to the religious feeling of medieval man.  It was wise to remove a criminal for the space of a year or more from the scene of his crime.  The discomforts and expense of his journey would be a punishment to him, while the achievement of his task and the emotional atmosphere of his goal would give him a feeling of spiritual cleansing and strength.  He returned a better man.  (p. 25)

Sola Scriptura Made Slippery

I didn't notice how slippery some defenses of Sola Scriptura are until I began to oppose the doctrine.  One of the things that has surprised me is how the definition of what Sola Scriptura is tends to subtly shift and change when someone tries to nail it down and expose its full logical conclusions.

According to Sola Scriptura, the Bible alone is the ultimate and only infallible authority (in terms of special revelation).  Here is a good statement of the position from the Westminster Confession of Faith:

The supreme judge by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined; and in whose sentence we are to rest; can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.  (WCF 1:10)

Most advocates of Sola Scriptura assert that we ought to listen very carefully to the historic teachers and councils of the Church, and that we ought to default to trust in their judgment much of the time.  If we find our own interpretations of Scripture to be contrary to theirs, this should give us a weighty pause.

But here's the real question:  What happens when we've listened very carefully to the opinions of the Church Fathers, the historic teachers of the Church, Church councils, popes, etc., and still it seems to us, upon as careful analysis as possible, that what they have said contradicts what the Bible says?  What do we do then?  The primary founder of the idea of Sola Scriptura (Martin Luther, of course) had no doubt on this point:

Unless I am convinced by Scripture and plain reason - I do not accept the authority of the popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other - my conscience is captive to the Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant anything for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen.

If our interpretation of Scripture contradicts the unanimous consensus of the historic Church, that should give us great pause.  It should cause us to seriously and very carefully reconsider our position.  But, in the end, according to Sola Scriptura, it should not cause us to give up our position, because ultimately only the Bible is infallible.

This is obviously the logical implication of Sola Scriptura.  However, I have found that when one articulates this too plainly and clearly, one often finds oneself accused of misrepresenting Sola Scriptura.  "That's not what Sola Scriptura means!  You're twisting it!  Sola Scriptura doesn't mean we should just go off by ourselves with our Bibles and ignore the whole history of the Church, all the ancient teachers, etc.!  On the contrary, a right understanding of Sola Scriptura tells us to treat with great deference and respect the traditions of the Church and to do our interpreting in the context of those who have gone before, and to be taught by the Fathers, the councils, and the great creeds and confessions of the historic Church!"

Notice that this response completely misses the point.  I never said that Sola Scriptura means that we should go off by ourselves and read the Bible without input from anyone else, or that we shouldn't have great respect and deference for the traditions of the Church, etc.  All I said was that, when push comes to shove, after I've listened to all the input I can get, and after laborious and careful examinations and re-examinations--if, after all of that, it still appears to me that the Bible disagrees with the unanimous consensus of the historic Church, Sola Scriptura tells us to go with our own interpretations of Scripture over the consensus of the historic Church.

I think that putting this so plainly makes a lot of Protestants very uncomfortable, especially those (like Presbyterians, Anglicans, etc.) who want to distance themselves from all those "hillbilly" evangelicals who go off with "just the Bible and me," no education, no awareness of Church history, etc., and come up with goofy personal interpretations and then start their own new church in their living room.  Perhaps subconsciously to avoid this discomfort, they try to make distinctions that aren't there, such as the distinction Protestant teacher Keith Mathison has made between Solo Scriptura and Sola Scriptura, where the former is the hillbilly evangelical version and the latter is the historic, tradition-minded version.  Unfortunately, as many have pointed out, no principled distinction really exists to be made.  Sure, various people who try to practice Sola Scriptura are more or less historically-informed, literate, respectful of traditional positions, etc., but the basic principle is the same--the Bible alone is infallible and so the Bible should be followed even if it should seem to contradict everyone else.  I'm not aware of any serious position adopted by any Protestant church which says that we should read the Bible while ignoring all input from anyone else or from earlier teachers in the Church.  Every Protestant group that I am aware of that has articulated any clear position on this affirms that tradition is valuable, that we should know history, etc.  They simply add that none of those things are infallible, and the Bible alone is.  And that is the same position that is advocated by Keith Mathison and all the cultured Presbyterians and Anglicans as well.

Those who say that Sola Scriptura is being misrepresented when it is said that it implies that we must follow our own interpretations of the Bible even, if need be, against the unanimous position of the historic Christian Church need to think more carefully through their own doctrine.  If we are not to follow our own interpretations as the ultimate authority, what is the alternative?  Are we to abandon what it seems to us that the Bible is saying in order to defer to historic councils, teachers, etc.?  This makes no sense in the context of Sola Scriptura, for it would be to treat these ancient councils and teachers as if they were infallible, and it would be to give up the practice of checking what they said against the Scriptures before believing them, which is the whole point of Sola Scriptura!  Imagine if Luther had done this:

Unless I am convinced by Scripture and plain reason - I do not accept the authority of the popes and councils, for they have contradicted each other - my conscience is captive to the Word of God . . . Well, on second thought, if all those popes and councils and teachers disagree with me, I should probably just trust them, even if to me it looks like the Bible contradicts them.  Who am I to follow my own interpretations of Scripture over against the historic positions of the Church?  Never mind, then.  I recant.

That would have been the end of the Protestant Reformation!

Sola Scriptura tells us that we are not to trust implicitly any authority outside of Scripture--whether that be ancient fathers, councils, popes, large groups of Christians, or whatever.  We are only to trust the Bible implicitly, because only it has infallible authority.  This implies, as the Westminster Confession put it, that we must test or examine all the ideas of men--ancient or modern, majority or minority--in the light of Scripture.  But Scripture must be interpreted.  Whose interpretation, then, are we to finally trust?  Of course, it has to be our own.  If we were to trust implicitly the interpretations of ancient writers, that would be the same as to give up testing their opinions by any standard higher than themselves.  If we must test all these opinions by the Bible alone, the only thing that that can mean is that we must try as hard as we can to figure out what we think the Bible is saying, and then judge what everyone else is saying--including what everyone else says the Bible is saying--by our own interpretations of the Bible.  This is not a misrepresentation of Sola Scriptura; this is Sola Scriptura!

And yet, as I mentioned, those who try to point this out clearly and plainly typically get accused of misrepresenting or over-simplifying Sola Scriptura.  And those who actually try consistently to practice this have an even worse time!  I can attest to this personally.  As I discuss in greater detail here, back when I was a Presbyterian (in the Orthodox Presbyterian denomination), I came to certain convictions about church government that I believed to be biblical (and historically Presbyterian as well).  These convictions (along with some others) led me to the conclusion that the Orthodox Presbyterian Church (OPC) is in schism, and that ideally we all ought to join another Presbyterian denomination.  The response of the pastor of my OPC was, partly, to accuse me of arrogance for asserting my own opinions on these matters against the dominant judgment of the Reformed tradition (as he thought).  It didn't matter that I claimed to believe my position on biblical grounds; the mere fact that I would disagree with so many others was enough to prove how presumptuous and conceited I was.  He also accused me of intentionally defying the authority of the Church.  This reminded me of Martin Luther's trial, and I told him so.  He was not impressed.  He told me I was misrepresenting Sola Scriptura and misusing it to avoid having to listen to the Church.  So it appears that it is one thing to proclaim Sola Scriptura and the authority of the Bible over "popes and councils" in the abstract, but when one tries to apply this to some particular leader or church tribunal, one sometimes finds that Sola Scriptura had better not be brought out of the abstract and into conflict with the currently prevailing tradition!

Jimmy Akin articulates this situation well:

There may, in any given congregation, be a number of theologically inclined people who make a serious study of the Bible, but the average person simply listens to the exposition given to the Scriptures in the Sunday sermon or weekday Bible study and accepts it. The pastor or Bible study leader sketches out what his view of the Scripture is, and it is not rigorously questioned by the average listener. The average person does not go out and get commentaries from opposing viewpoints, compare them to the pastor’s view, and then do a rigorous analysis of the arguments on both sides. . . . 

When it is exercised consistently, when the individual really does give his pastor’s and denomination’s teaching a rigorous analysis, he is likely to find out that his previous theological sloth is not the only barrier to his ability to exercise the absolute right of private judgment. There is a second barrier, for if he comes to the conclusion that the pastor or the denomination is simply wrong about something it considers important, then he is almost always confronted with two choices: Keep your mouth shut about this and don’t go advocating your private interpretation in the congregation (that would prompt a crisis of leadership and disturb the tranquillity of the sheep) or simply get out and take your private interpretation somewhere else. 

Any layman trying to stay in a congregation and advocate a different position on something the pastor or the denomination considers important will have first subtle and then no so subtle pressure put on him to either keep quiet or leave, and if he will do neither then he will finally be expelled from the body. . . . 

The hypocritical thing is not the expulsion of dissenters, but the holding out of the promise of private interpretation, of promoting it by continual rhetorical harping on this theme and by encouraging the faithful to look down their noses at denominations which don’t preach this principle, when in reality the promise is: “You have an absolute right to interpret the Scriptures for yourself, but we will cast you out if you disagree with something we consider important.”

The key problem here is not that Protestant churches have confessions, or that they enforce them; the problem is rather the tendency of many (particularly confessionally-minded) Protestants to act as if there is some kind of impropriety or arrogance in trying to re-test the convictions of some particular Protestant confession by means of one's own attempts to understand Scripture.  This attitude, as we have pointed out, is inconsistent with Sola Scriptura.  Many Protestants, then, tend to use Sola Scriptura selectively, as something to be turned on at the proper times and turned off at other times, depending on whether it will be helpful or more trouble than it's worth.  If you don't like "Roman innovations" or other historic traditions of the Church, and you want to challenge them based on your own interpretations of Scripture, that is the time to turn it on.  But if someone points out how subjective it is, or uses it to challenge your own traditions, then that is the time to turn it off and accuse your opponent of misrepresenting it.  (I'm not suggesting that any of this is done consciously, but it is often done nonetheless.)

I will end with a selection from St. Francis de Sales, who, as is so often the case, has articulated some of the key issues in a way that really hits home.  He describes well what Sola Scriptura, applied consistently and thoroughly, really looks like in practice, and how Protestant teachers so often allow it to a point only to stifle it when it starts to get out of hand and threaten their establishments.  This is from The Catholic Controversy (Rockford, IL: TAN Books and Publishers, 1989), 228-230 (I've adjusted the spacing to fit better in blog format):

But what need have I to go far?  Beza says in the Epistle to the King of France, that your reform will refuse the authority of no Council; so far he speaks well, but what follows spoils all:  "provided," says he, "that the Word of God test it." 

But, for God's sake, when will they cease darkening the question!  The Councils, after the fullest consultation, when the test has been made by the holy touchstone of the Word of God, decide and define some article.  If after all this another test has to be tried before their determination is received, will not another also be wanted?  Who will not want to apply his test, and whenever will the matter be settled?  After the test has been applied by the Council, Beza and his disciples want to try again?  And who shall stop another from asking as much, in order to see if the Council's test has been properly applied?  And why not a third to know if the second is faithful?--and then a fourth, to test the third?  Everything must be done over again, and posterity will never trust antiquity but will go ever turning upside down the holiest articles of the faith in the wheel of their understandings. 

We are not hesitating as to whether we should receive a doctrine at haphazard, or should test it by the application of God's Word.  But what we say is that when a Council has applied this test, our brains have not now to revise but to believe.  Once let the canons of Councils be submitted to the test of private individuals,--as many persons, so many tastes, so many opinions. 

The article of the real presence of Our Lord in the most Holy Sacrament had been received under the test of many Councils.  Luther wished to make another trial, Zwingle another trial on that of Luther, Brentius another on these, Calvin another,--as many tests so many opinions.  But, I beseech you, if the test as applied by a General Council be not enough to settle the minds of men, how shall the authority of some nobody be able to do it?  That is too great an ambition. 

Some of the most learned ministers of Lausanne, these late years, Scripture and analogy of faith in hand, oppose the doctrine of Calvin concerning justification.  To bear the attack of their arguments no new reasons appear, though some wretched little tracts, insipid and void of doctrine, are set a-going.  How are these men treated?  They are persecuted, driven away, threatened.  Why is this?  "Because they teach a doctrine contrary to the profession of faith of our Church."  Gracious heavens!  the doctrine of the Council of Nice, after an approbation of thirteen hundred years, is to be submitted to the tests of Luther, Calvin, and Beza, and there shall be no trial made of the Calvinistic doctrine, quite new, entirely doubtful, patched up and inconsistent!  Why, at least, may not each one try it for himself?  If that of Nice has not been able to quiet your brains, why would you, by your statements, impose quiet on the brains of your companions, who are as good as you, as wise and as consistent?  Behold the iniquitousness of these judges; to give liberty to their own opinions they lower the ancient Councils, while with their own opinions they would bridle those of others.  They seek their own glory, be sure of that; and just as much as they take away from the Ancients do they attribute to themselves.

For more on Sola Scriptura, see here and here.  For more on how Anglicans in particular tend to want to "have their cake and eat it too" when it comes to Sola Scriptura, see here and here.  For a great article responding to Keith Mathison's attempt to defend Sola Scriptura from the subjectivity of ultimate reliance on individual private interpretation, see here.  For a shorter version of the same article, see here.  For another great selection from St. Francis de Sales on the ineffectiveness of Sola Scriptura to solve doctrinal disputes, see here.

ADDENDUM 8/14/20:  To see a real-life conversation involving a Protestant using a "slippery Sola Scriptura" method of dialoguing with a Catholic (me) about the logical implications of Sola Scriptura, see here (the original, short post and the comments).

In the course of the brief conversation, as you can see if you look through it, the author of the post apparently contradicted herself with regard to how Sola Scriptura relates to Tradition.  I can show this very briefly with a few snippets:

"Sola Scriptura does require ‘refusal to give implicit and unquestioning agreement even to the consensus of the Church.’"

So if the consensus of the whole Church thinks Scripture says X, but, after careful investigation, I think it says Y, I should go with my own interpretation of Scripture.  Right?  Isn't that necessarily implied in the idea that I should "refuse to give implicit and unquestioning agreement even to the consensus of the Church"?  I pressed her on this, and she began to backpedal.

"[It is] of course right to want to ‘avoid the conclusion that Sola Scriptura inherently implies that the ultimate deciding point for theological doctrine is one’s own personal interpretation of Scripture.’" . . .  It doesn’t strike me as unusual that [a Reformed] pastor would object to someone putting their own interpretations of Scripture over the views of the great Reformed theologians. It is not consistent with Sola Scriptura to jettison the accumulated wisdom of the church."

So, if the consensus of the whole Church, or even just of all the Reformed churches, thinks Scripture says X, but, after careful investigation, I think it says Y, I should go with the Reformed churches' interpretation of Scripture?  This seems to be the opposite of what she just said above.  It implies putting implicit trust in the Reformed churches' interpretations of Scripture, for the only alternative to such implicit trust is to check their interpretations against my own investigation of what Scripture seems to be saying and then to reject their interpretations if I judge them to be wrong.  Right?  So I pressed her on this, and she backpedaled yet again.  Should we put implicit trust in the consensus of the Church, or of the Reformed churches?

"No, 'implicit trust' is something we give only to God. That aside, yes, it is safer to assume that if I as an individual think that Scripture says X when the consensus of Reformed theologians says Y, then I am probably wrong."

So, if the consensus of the whole Church, or even just of all the Reformed churches, thinks Scripture says X, but, after careful investigation, I think it says Y, what should I do?  Should I assume that the Reformed churches are right and I am wrong, thus putting implicit trust in the Reformed churches?  Or should I refuse such implicit trust and test the opinions of the Reformed churches by examining them against my own study of Scripture, and then (admittedly reluctantly) rejecting them if they disagree with my own best interpretation of what Scripture seems to be saying?

You can see how the author of the post finds herself tied in knots here, being pushed by Sola Scriptura to its own logical conclusion--the requirement that we make our own interpretations of Scripture our supreme authority--while yet not wanting to end up at that conclusion, instinctively feeling that it is more reasonable to put implicit trust in the Church as the Supreme Court for the proper interpretation of Scripture.  Of course, as a Protestant, she has to take the former route, for the latter route is inconsistent with the fundamental foundation of Protestantism and would lead to the more historic positions like Catholicism or Orthodoxy.  But slippery-ness is used (not necessarily consciously) to avoid having to fully face the dilemma.

Nice, Short Statement on Justification

It is from Rome and the Eastern Churches, Second Edition, by Aidan Nichols (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2010), 293-294.

Although justification is gratuitous, coming about as it does through the free grace of God, this does not render it merely a legal fiction--a divine decision to regard us as other than we are.  The grace of justification is not something extrinsic, in the sense of something that remains abidingly external to our own being.  On the contrary, just as each sinner is responsible for his sins (else wrongdoing would not be his), so the forgiveness of those sins must affect every part of him.  The New Testament speaks of the transformation of the person into a new creature, who is the friend of God.  For Saint Paul, the Christian presses on to make salvation his own, as Philippians 3 testifies, and if the Christian life is seriously lived, then, for the same apostle, writing in his second extant letter to the Church at Corinth, our inner nature is being renewed every day.  There must be, in other words, a thorough and progressive appropriation of grace at all levels of our existence.

What is the Catholic Doctrine of Salvation?

Protestants (and some Catholics) have some interesting ideas about what the Catholic doctrine of salvation is.  In Protestant circles, it is frequently portrayed as a system by which we earn salvation through our own merits rather than salvation being a gift of God through Christ.  In this post, therefore, I would like to lay out some basics on this topic.  I don't intend to get complicated or too detailed here, but merely to provide a brief skeleton outline of the Catholic system to serve as an introduction and an avenue to further exploration.

First of all, if you want to read up on the basics of the Catholic doctrine of salvation from official Catholic sources (other than the Bible), these three sources are a good place to start:  1. The section on "grace and justification" in the Catechism of the Catholic Church.  2. Session V and Session VI of the Council of Trent, which deal with the topics of original sin and justification.  (Only the first section of Session V, "Decree Concerning Original Sin," is relevant, the other part dealing with other matters.)  3. The Canons of the Council of Orange, which are directed against the heresy of Semipelagianism.

Now here is a statement of my own summing up some key points in the Catholic doctrine of salvation:

Adam and Eve, at their creation, were given a supernatural gift of grace (original holiness and justice/righteousness) by which they were able to love God supremely and obey him. However, they were tempted and fell into sin, rebelling against God, preferring their own ways to him. As a result of this, Adam and Eve entered into a state of mortal sin, which consisted of the guilt of their rebellion and consequent desert of eternal damnation, as well as a new fallen condition in which, without a new grace given, they would be unable to love God supremely and would forever prefer inferior goods to him. Their basic human constitution (consisting of natural human characteristics such as reason and will) were not destroyed by their Fall, but their faculties were bent away from God and their will became inclined to sin. Since their will was not destroyed, they were still responsible for their choices, but they were so bent towards sin that they would never be able to be reconciled to God or turn back to him as their chief good (and nor would they be able to overcome the other effects of sin, such as alienation within themselves and with others and with the rest of creation) without new grace from God. Nothing in their human nature, without grace, could at all remedy this situation. 

When Adam sinned, he lost his state of original justice and holiness and entered into a fallen condition, but his sin did not affect him alone. As father of the human race, his fallen condition was passed down from him to all his natural descendants. As a result, all humans are naturally conceived and born in a state deprived of original justice and holiness and subject to all the disorders this state naturally brings. Because of the fact that this fallen condition inevitably (without grace) inclines to sin and damnation, it came to be called the state of "original sin." In those (such as very young children) who are incapable of engaging in moral activity of their own (due to lack of ability to reason abstractly, etc.), this fallen condition does not result in personal sin and guilt immediately (because they are not capable of it), but it will inevitably lead to a personal state of mortal sin once an adequate capacity to reason and engage in moral actions develops (such as when children reach such a capable age). Thus, we can distinguish between "original sin" which is the condition that leads to sin and "personal sin" which inevitably results from it in those capable of such. As a result of the Fall, then, grace aside, all human beings who have reached the age of reason and personal moral actions are in a state of mortal sin that it is impossible they should emerge from and which will lead inevitably to eternal damnation (the worst part of which consists of the infinite loss of God and his blessedness and the fullness of misery that accompanies this). 

This fallen condition can only be overcome by the supernatural grace of God, merited by the sacrifice and righteousness of Christ and applied by the Holy Spirit. God offers his grace to all men, and so all are without excuse for not turning back to God in reliance on that grace, and yet no one will ever have the will to turn back unless they are moved by grace to do so. When God's grace converts a soul (looking specifically at the soul of an adult), he applies actual grace to the will, turning it back to God so that the person comes to repent of his sins, love God above all else for who he is, and sincerely and fully receive Christ and his mercy. Thus, moved by grace, the convert leaves his state of mortal sin and enters into a state of grace, into a state of forgiveness of sins and holiness. While this transition occurs by means of cooperation between God's grace and the man's will, yet the entire transition, including man's very change of will, must be ultimately attributed to the grace of God, for man's good will is itself a result of grace and without grace man can do nothing. There are some who are never converted to Christ by God's grace.  There are some to whom God gives grace only temporarily, without the gift of final perseverance, and so they only taste of Christ temporarily and do not ultimately attain to eternal salvation. But to God's elect, chosen from eternity, God gives the fullness of his grace, including the gift of final perseverance and the full fruition of eternal salvation in the enjoyment of God. God's grace also often works on infants, who are rescued from original sin (though the inclination to sin is not wholly removed from them or from adults in this life) and restored to a state of justice, though the personal moral fruits of this will only appear later in life. 

In the next life, the saved will be fully purified of all sin permanently, but in this life Christians still must struggle by the power of grace against their remaining inclination to sin, and they often fall into various sins. Sometimes God allows them to fall out of a state of grace entirely (mortal sins), and then moves them by his grace to restoration. Other times he allows them to fall into sin to a lesser degree, such that while they experience a sinful disorder it is not to the extent that it disrupts or destroys their overall relationship of love to God (venial sins). All sin by nature is in opposition to God and its natural fruit is alienation from God and misery, and yet not all sins are such as to remove one from a habitual state of grace. (To use an analogy, think of the difference between a fatal infection and a non-fatal infection. By its very nature, all infection tends to death, but not all infection actually infests the body in such a way as to bring destruction to the body overall and therefore bring death.) 

God's grace works above and beyond his sacraments (such as his prevenient grace that moves the will to resort to the sacraments in the first place), and yet God's habitual communion with his people takes place (ordinarily) not in a condition of isolation from Christ's Church but in communion with the rest of it and through the reception of the sacraments. For example, when a person is moved by grace to repent and turn to Christ, his reconciliation with Christ is liturgically enacted and sealed in his baptism (or in the Sacrament of Reconciliation if he has already been baptized). This is not to say that the grace of God is tied in a rigid way to the reception of the sacraments--for example, a person who has turned to God and desires baptism but is not able to receive baptism (perhaps he dies before this is possible, or he is kept from it by some external obstacle) is still saved by the grace and Spirit of God (this is usually called "the baptism of desire," for he is linked to baptism through his desire for it, and this desire might even be only implicit, say, if he didn't even know he should be baptized but desired God's salvation)--but that God's grace and his communion with man is ordinarily facilitated largely through the reception of the sacraments. 

Along with the eternal consequences of sin and grace, such as eternal damnation and its forgiveness and the fundamental conversion of the soul, we must also take into account temporal consequences of sin and grace. Those who are forgiven of their sins and have entered a state of grace are not always necessarily freed from all the temporal consequences of their sins, and God's grace works not only to grant eternal salvation but also to wean man from sin through various trials and penances in this life (and also oftentimes in purgatory after death, which completes the purification of the regenerated soul so that he is fully fit for the full enjoyment of God).

Eternal life is granted as a reward for good works, but those who are saved will have nothing to boast about, because all their works are nothing other than the work of God's grace, the fruit of Christ's righteousness applied to their lives by the Holy Spirit.  Those who end up damned will have no one to blame but themselves, for they freely rejected God's offer of salvation.  Damnation is ultimately to be attributed to the fallen free will of man, while salvation is ultimately to be attributed to the grace of God.

Salvation includes not just the forgiveness of sins and sanctification, but also adoption, whereby we become children of God in a special and supernatural way through our union with Christ, the one Son of God.  By grace, we become co-heirs with Christ of the glory of God, just as he is the heir of his Father by nature.  The ultimate fruit of salvation is to share in the life and love of the Blessed Trinity for all eternity.

The Catholic doctrine of salvation is a middle way that opposes two opposite errors.  On the one hand it avoids the error of the Pelagians and Semipelagians, who attribute the saved man's good will (and thus his righteousness) ultimately to man himself and the use of his free will.  Catholic faith affirms, on the contrary, that the ultimate source of the goodness of the regenerate is God's grace.  On the other hand, Catholic faith avoids the error of those (including some, but not all, Protestants) who say that since grace is the source of salvation, there is no requirement for man to use his will to cooperate with grace or to strive to do good works, or that the saved have no good works that are truly pleasing to God.  Catholic faith affirms, on the contrary, that while the grace merited for us through the passion and righteousness of Christ is the only ultimate source of salvation, yet God's grace works in us by moving our wills to cooperate with his grace so that we are made holy and do holy works, and that this inward holiness and these holy works, produced in us by grace, are truly pleasing to God and fit to be rewarded with eternal life.

Two quotations from the Apostle Paul in the New Testament well sum up both sides of the grace/works equation and how they relate to each other:  1. Ephesians 2:8-10:  "For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them."  2. Philippians 2:12-13:  "Wherefore, my beloved, as ye have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure."

Some readers might be interested in following up on some of this with more specifics.  If you are interested in getting a better idea of how the Catholic ideas of penance, purgatory, and indulgences fit into this overall scheme, see here.  If you are interested in seeing some thoughts on how all of this relates to concepts like predestination and efficacious grace, see here and here.  If you are interested in reading more about the nature of justification, see here.

Was Molina Actually Wrong?

I've just been reading a very thorough account of the teachings of Molina and the early Molinist Jesuits, Banez and the anti-Molinist Dominicans, and the drawn-out controversy they carried on during the time of the Congregation De Auxiliis.  (You can read about the controversy here)  My reading has come from an excellent book by Guido Stucco, The Catholic Doctrine of Predestination from Luther to Jansenius (Xlibris, 2014).

Up until now, I have believed that Molinism teaches a view of the will and of grace which is similar to that espoused in Arminian Protestantism, where the will is deemed to be independent from any causal factors beyond itself which might determine what it will choose.  In this view, the will acts basically as a First Cause, and its decisions do not in any way flow from the providential plan of God.  God can only know about them by discovering them as something coming from outside himself.  Since the will cannot be caused to make any choices by anything outside itself, the good will that chooses Christ for salvation cannot be a product of grace but is produced from the native power of the will itself,  Grace merely opens the door for the will to produce from itself its own goodness.  Arminians hold the independence of the will so highly that some of them (such as the Open Theists) have even ended up denying that God has foreknowledge of the future, because God knowing the future would imply that our decisions are already determined and cannot be turn out otherwise than God already knows they will be.  According to these extreme Arminians, God cannot know our choices until we make them, since they are First Causes and thus cannot be predicted on the basis of anything that precedes them, and thus God cannot know the future until it happens.

But I am not now sure that Molinism has taught or teaches any such ideas.  Here's the basic idea of some of what Molina taught about the will, predestination, and grace, as I have understood his views from Guido Stucco's (very thorough) representation of them (so keep in mind that what this is is my interpretation of Guido Stucco's interpretation of Molina):

God has middle knowledge.  "Middle knowledge" refers to God's ability to know not only what will in fact happen but everything that could possibly happen and everything that would happen if other things happened.  Since that came out very confusing, let me illustrate by an example:  Let's say Bob decided to go to Denny's to eat dinner.  At Denny's, he ordered a hamburger.  However, he could have decided to go to Red Lobster for dinner, and if he had done that he would have ordered fish and chips.  God knows not only what Bob will actually do but what Bob would have done had things gone differently.

So picture God in eternity past (of course, God is not actually in time, but we can use time as a proxy for logical sequences in God's thought and will).  He has before him all possibilities, all possible worlds he could create.  In each of these possible worlds, there is distinct historical narrative.  God chooses to actualize the possible world he prefers to all the rest.  Part of what gets decided when God decides which world to actualize is who will end up being saved in the end and who will not.  Consider two of these possible worlds.  In Possible World A, Bob will encounter Set of Circumstances X, and through all the things that Bob experiences in that set of circumstances God knows that Bob will choose to accept Christ, persevere to the end, and receive eternal salvation.  However, in Possible World B, Bob will encounter Set of Circumstances Y, and God knows that through all the things that Bob would experience in that set of circumstances Bob will choose to reject Christ to the end of his life and end up in eternal damnation.  But Bob, of course, is not the only person in the world.  In Possible World A, Jerry will end up deciding to reject Christ and will be damned, while in Possible World B he will be saved.  Let's say that God freely decides, sovereignly and of his own good pleasure, that he will actualize Possible World A and not Possible World B.  In that case, God has freely elected and predestined Bob to eternal salvation while rejecting and reprobating Jerry.  God could very well have freely decided to do the opposite, or he could have actualized yet another possible world in which both Bob and Jerry would have been either saved or damned.  Since God's choice was free and unconstrained, based on his own good pleasure and not drawn by any necessity outside of himself or by any merits in either Bob or Jerry which determined his choice, we can say that God's eternal decrees of predestination and reprobation were unconditional.  However, Bob received salvation because he chose to accept Christ and persevere to the end of his life of his own free will.  He could have rejected Christ, but it just so turned out that he didn't.  God's eternal ordination of Bob to eternal salvation took into account the foreknown fact that Bob would choose to accept Christ when he could have chosen to reject him, so in that sense we can say that God's election of him was based on Bob's foreseen future choice; but since the whole historical narrative in which Bob made that choice was actualized by God freely, and God was perfectly free to actualize a different narrative, we can still say that Bob's predestination was ultimately unconditional.

The Dominicans severely attacked this Molinist teaching on a number of grounds.  One of their chief complaints was that Molina was making it sound like Bob's choice to accept Christ was something Bob produced on his own as opposed to being something produced in him by grace.  Molina wanted to say that both Bob and Jerry received grace sufficient to save them if they would have accepted it.  In fact, Molina would even grant that perhaps Jerry might have received more graces than Bob, but he rejected his grace while Bob accepted his.  The Dominicans interpreted Molina and the Molinists as saying that the difference between Bob and Jerry was not a matter of divine grace but of some difference stemming ultimately from their two wills, and they pointed out that this would make Bob's good choice a product of his own will ultimately and not of God's grace, contrary to the Catholic doctrine (see, for example, the Second Council of Orange) which strongly affirms that all good will, along with all things that lead to or are a part of salvation, are entirely a gift from God.

So the big question is, What was it, ultimately, that caused Bob to choose to accept Christ while Jerry rejected Christ?  It seems to me that if the Molinists will grant that it was divine grace that made the difference here and it was divine grace that produced Bob's choice for Christ, I can see no grounds for opposing the Molinist point of view.  One might still quibble with bits and pieces of it, or with the terminology of its formulations, but there would be nothing in it that would be obviously contrary to anything in Catholic faith or in the Augustinian doctrines of grace affirmed by the Catholic Church.  In all my reading thus far, I can't tell for sure what the Molinists were attempting to do here.  I expected to find clear Arminian-type statements from the Molinists, but they keep coming short of making such statements.  Granted, they sometimes talk in ways that sound less Augustinian and more "Arminian," but they never seem to actually get there.  Also, they frequently make comments that sound more Augustinian than I would have expected.  The concept of "middle knowledge" itself, far from implying the sort of situation where God's predestination is not the ultimate explanation for all that happens, actually seems to imply exactly that, for if our free choices came ultimately only from ourselves and were in no way produced by God, then God could not know about them except by seeing what we actually end up choosing.  Middle knowledge, on the contrary, has God knowing what we would choose before we actually make a choice, which implies that our choices are not uncaused, first-causal events but are explained as parts of a larger coherent causal nexus (so that God could know exactly what we would choose).  This is why Open Theists object to middle knowledge, and want to replace it instead with the idea that God knows not what will happen in various circumstances but only what could or might happen.  To say that God knows for sure what would happen implies that our choices are part of a causal nexus that is ultimately set in place by God when he actualizes the universe he wants--unconditional predestination.  So middle knowledge requires predestination.  So long as the Molinists also acknowledge that the very structure of reality which creates the possibility of middle knowledge--the laws of logic and causal relations and in general how the world works--is not a given that comes from outside of God but is rooted, along with all of reality, in him, and so long as they acknowledge that when the will chooses to enter into a state of grace as well as to remain in a state of grace, these good choices are a product not of natural free will but of supernatural grace,  then at this point I see no real theological problems with the Molinist paradigm.

So, at this point, I'm not sure I have enough information to draw a clear conclusion on this matter.  What I will say is that the Molinist-Dominican controversy is more complicated than I previously thought.  I agree with the Dominicans' arguments as they are directed against what they construed Molinists to be saying, but I'm not sure anymore that it's what the Molinists were actually saying.  The Molinists, in turn, accused their Dominican opponents of being fatalists, of denying free will, etc., and I'm quite sure from what I've read that this was false.  So perhaps the whole controversy will turn out to have been more rooted in misunderstanding than any greatly substantial or significant theological disagreement.  Perhaps, to my surprise, it will turn out that nobody in this controversy was actually arguing for an Arminian-like viewpoint and that everyone was affirming a basically good Augustinian viewpoint.  At any rate, what I've learned has given me a new appreciation for why perhaps the Church refrained from officially deciding the controversy or condemning the Molinists.  There may not have been anything there that really warranted being condemned after all.

On pp. 194-195 of his book, Guido Stucco articulates eleven propositions put forward by Jesuit theologian Achille Gagliardi during the time of the Jesuit-Dominican controversy that Gagliardi believed to be affirmed by both the Jesuits (the Molinists) and the Dominicans.  The list is very enlightening (I've added spaces between the points for easier reading, since I couldn't exactly reproduce the formatting in Stucco's book):

1)  God has a distinct and perfect providence of all acts of human free will, and concurs in each of them effectively and directly. 

2)  The creaturely will requires help to receive the supernatural ability to act and to produce a supernatural deed in union with God's help. 

3)  Creaturely will is also in need of prevenient grace, so that through it, it may be stirred and dispose itself to produce such deeds. This happens not only extrinsically, through an external object/action proposed to the human will, but also intrinsically, by enlightening the mind and inclining the will to consent. 

4)  This prevenient help is given exclusively out of God's good pleasure and will; therefore, the beginning of faith and of Justification derives from God alone and not at all from our free will. 

5)  Besides this, the supernatural concurrence of God is required, so that, acting in unison with free will, it may directly produce as the first and main cause man's free determination and consent. 

6)  Sufficient grace, in virtue of which a man is able be [sic] converted, is one thing; efficacious grace, by which God ensures he is infallibly converted, is another. Thus, we read in Scripture expressions such as man "is drawn," "the will is prepared by the Lord," (Pr. 8:35); "God works in us the willing and the doing" (Phil 2:13). Also, according to Augustine, "This grace, therefore, which the divine generosity gives in a hidden manner to human hearts is not rejected by any hard heart" (Predestination of the Saints 8,13); "It turns a person from unwilling to willing" (Against Julian III, 122); "God does whatever he wants of the human will." All these things are true, as the human will remains free and un-violated. 

7)  This efficacious help derives from God's efficacious intention and from his absolute intention to convert a person. This is brought about exclusively by God's good pleasure and by nothing else: there is no other cause which is in man's power. 

8)  God predetermined with an absolute decree and good pleasure of his will those who will consent to his grace; only these will be infallibly saved, and nobody else. 

9)  There is no cause of predestination on the part of the human will. 

10)  Predestination involves the following: a) God prepares all the efficacious means of grace necessary for salvation; b) through it, the elect are distinguished from the reprobate, so that no one has any reason to rejoice in themselves; c) As Paul said: "It does not, therefore, depend on human desire or effort, but on God's mercy" (Rom 9:16); d) The number of the elect established by it is certain; e) No one, other than the predestined, will be saved; f) It is to be attributed to the higher and inscrutable nature of the divine mind why this person will be saved, but not that one. 

11)  The human will, albeit moved and stimulated by grace, can consent or dissent to it.  [Footnote 109:  "Serry, Historiae congregationum, (1709), 202-207. Serry found these theses in the Biblioteca Augustinina, vol. fig. H.")

If the Jesuits and the Dominicans really agreed on all of these points, then it is not easy to see why Molinism should be considered Semipelagian or "Arminian."  (And note that a Jesuit wrote this list!)

On p. 198, Stucco records some comments made by Pope Paul V to the Spanish ambassador regarding why he did not make a final decision in the controversy:

I postponed making a decision in the matter of de auxiliis for three reasons: the first, in order to be conscientious, and also considering that time teaches and shows the truth about everything, acting like a great judge and censor of all things. The second, because both parties are in substantial agreement with Catholic truth, namely that God through his efficacious grace makes us act and turns us from unwilling to willing subjects, bending and changing human will. There is disagreement about that, but only concerning the manner in which God does this: the Dominicans say that he predetermines our wills in a physical manner, namely, really and efficaciously, while the Jesuits claim that he does so congruously and morally. Both opinions can be defended. The third reason is that in our day and age, in which there are many heresies, it is most appropriate to preserve and uphold the reputation and credibility of both religious orders, since to discredit either one may turn out to be greatly harmful. If we were to ask what we are to believe in this matter, I would say that we must uphold and follow the teachings of the Council of Trent, Session VI, On Justification, which are very clear and straightforward about what was the error and heresy of Pelagians and Semipelagians, as well as Calvin's.  This session also teaches the Catholic doctrine according to which it is necessary for human free will to be moved, excited and helped by God's grace, and that the will can freely assent or dissent.  The Council did not entertain the question of how grace works, but merely touched upon it and left the explanation alone, regarding it useless and unnecessary, thus imitating Pope Celestine, who, having, defined some issues or propositions on this matter, said he did not want to condemn or elaborate on more difficult or subtler ones.  (Footnote 114:  "Denzinger, 1997 a."; hyperlink added)

From what Pope Paul V says here, and from the list of agreed-upon propositions given by Jesuit theologian Achille Gagliardi, it appears that both the Jesuits and the Dominicans agreed that the predestination of the elect is unconditional, rooted in God's sovereign purpose and not man's free will, and that while sufficient grace is given to all men to be able to accept Christ, yet God gives only to his elect an efficacious grace which infallibly converts the will and causes it to persevere to the end and so actually receive eternal salvation.  Those who receive this efficacious grace will be saved, while those who don't won't be.  What more could a good Augustinian ask for?  There is no problem with saying that sufficient grace is given to all men to accept Christ or that the will can either accept or reject grace.  Bob the elect and Jerry the reprobate have enough given to them so that, if they want to, both can choose Christ and persevere to the end.  But only Bob will in fact do so, while Jerry will not, and the difference between them ultimately stems not from some native ability that Bob has and Jerry doesn't but from the predestination and efficacious grace of God which is given to Bob and not to Jerry out of God's good pleasure and sovereign mercy.

I want to quote one last time from Stucco's book.  On pp. 169-170, Stucco mentions another list of propositions the Jesuits proposed at one point during the de auxiliis controversy as points in which they were in agreement with the Dominicans:

1) Man is given the help of prevenient efficacious grace, through which God brings about that man does what is good; 2) This help is a peculiar gift of God, distinct from sufficient grace; 3) This help is intrinsic to both man's intellect and will, consisting in the stimulation of both, which is to say, in the illumination of the intellect and in the motion of the will; 4) This help is supernatural and sent by God; 5) This help does not only exist on the part of the object, but also on the part of the power; 6) The motion of the will is real and precedes the application of the will to a specific action; 7) Once this efficacious help is put in place, it infallibly converts man.

Stucco mentions the response of the Dominicans to this list:

Ripalda recorded the Dominicans' satisfaction with these statements, saying that "They had no question about this convergence of views; instead, they were amazed that we agreed with them about these things, and said that if Molina and the Spanish Jesuits had said this much, there would have been no quarrel with their theologians."  [Footnote 51:  "Ripalda, 525."]

Again, what more could an Augustinian ask for?  And yet, the two parties continued to debate, and they never did reach a mutually-satisfactory agreement.

In conclusion, my previous thinking was that the Catholic Church has clearly affirmed salvation by grace alone, but that it refrained (for whatever reason) from condemning a particular view (Molinism) which, in its logical implications, contradicts this (though it did not declare this view correct either or promise not to condemn it in the future).  But now I'm thinking it may be that the Catholic Church never has refrained from condemning any Arminian-type viewpoint proposed seriously to its consideration.  I should remind readers, though, that I am still in no way an expert on Molinism, and I need to do much more research before I could declare any conclusions dogmatically.

ADDENDUM 2/23/16:  On pp. 298-300 of his book, Stucco provides another list by a theologian involved in the de auxiliis controversy of theological positions he thought both sides could agree on.  The theologian was Giovanni Antonio Bovio, a Carmelite who leaned in favor of Molina's doctrine and was a strong defender of the orthodoxy of the Jesuit position.  Once again, it is striking what Jesuit or Jesuit-leaning theologians thought that both sides could agree on (as before, I have adjusted spacing, etc.):

1)  Human nature has been so wounded by the Fall, that without the grace of God healing it, man cannot fulfill the whole natural law, nor avoid all mortal sins that are committed against it. 

2)  The same grace of God acting through Christ Jesus, is simply necessary to perform individual acts of belief, hope, love, penance as well as any other good deeds (no matter how easy they may appear), so that they may be fitting of God and of salvation--and not just as to make them easier to be carried out. 

3)  The necessity of exciting, healing, cooperating, prevenient and consequent grace must be acknowledged and upheld by everybody. 

4)  The very beginning of our justification must be attributed to the prevenient grace of God through Jesus Christ, which is bestowed on us by God in a simply gratuitous way, not because of any of our works, not because we want it, but so that we may want it. Anything that precedes that grace plays no role or has no merit in the bestowal of God's grace or in the attainment of salvation. 

5)  God gives to some people only his prevenient sufficient grace, with which they may truly and properly do what is good; thus, if they do not do it, their damnation must be attributed to them alone, and in no way whatsoever to God. 

6)  To some people God gives not only the ability to want and to do good, but by the help of his grace which we call "efficacious" he makes sure that they most surely and infallibly may want and do that which is good. 

7)  Likewise, to all the just he gives the help by which they are able not to sin, not to depart from goodness and to persevere to the end, if they want to. But to the saints predestined to the kingdom of God through his grace, is given such a help that without it they couldn't persevere and unfailingly want that which is good. 

8)  God gives his efficacious grace without playing favorites and not even according to his distributive justice, but rather to those whom he wants and out of his good pleasure and will; therefore, the reason he gives to some and not to others lies in his hidden and inscrutable judgments, and no cause whatsoever can be assigned on man's part. 

9)  Through this grace, God not only leads men, but draws them, turns them willing from unwilling, agreeing from dissenting, loving from fighting; he works in them the willingness and the working; transforms their wills and inclines their heart to what he wants and when he wants it. 

10)  This grace is: a) That divine benefit by which all those who are liberated are most certainly liberated; b) the calling according to God's purpose, which no elect can spurn; c) a high and mysterious calling that brings about one's consent to God's law and teachings; d) a hidden and mysterious doctrine that not only inclines people to do good, but persuades us to do it--by which God not only shows us the truth, but also engenders love in our hearts, giving to his elect to know what they are to do, and to do what they know ought to be done; e) the illumination and the inspiration which not only makes apparent that which was hidden, but also makes appear sweet that which one did not love before; f) through it, God not only illuminates the mind, showing us what needs to be done, but also inspires a good affection for it, giving us most efficacious strength to our will. 

11)  When grace begins to operate by itself, it brings about the intended result by himself, but by simultaneously cooperating with the human will. It is for this purpose that the will is prepared by the Lord, so that by assisting and cooperating with exciting and helping grace it may freely produce acts by which the will may dispose itself and move in virtue of its own freedom towards justice. 

12)  Through the efficacious grace of God the human free will is not taken away; likewise, without it, man has sufficient help to which, if he wants to, is able to assent. Once it is given, the ability to assent or dissent is still in place, so that man can still resist it, if he wants to (Serry's Appendix, pp 152, 153).

On pp. 295-301, Stucco describes how Bovio tried to defend the Jesuit position from Dominican attacks.  He asserted that the Dominicans had fundamentally misunderstood what Molina was saying on a number of points, and that he was more orthodox (from an Augustinian point of view) than they realized.

ADDENDUM 5/15/16:  Catholic Philosopher Alfred J. Freddoso comments here on how the Dominicans (following Dominican theologian Domingo Bañez) and the Molinists agreed on the absolute nature of God's providence--that everything that happens in history, good and evil, has been specifically ordained by God to come to pass:

According to the traditional doctrine of divine providence, God freely and knowingly plans, orders and provides for all the effects that constitute the created universe with its entire history, and he executes his chosen plan by playing an active causal role that ensures its exact realization. Since God is the perfect craftsman, not even trivial details escape his providential decrees. Whatever occurs is specifically decreed by God; more precisely, each effect produced in the created universe is either specifically and knowingly intended by him or, in concession to creaturely defectiveness, specifically and knowingly permitted by him. Divine providence thus has both a cognitive and a volitional aspect. By his pre-volitional knowledge God infallibly knows which effects would result, directly or indirectly, from any causal contribution he might choose to make to the created sphere. By his free will God chooses one from among the infinity of total sequences of created effects that are within his power to bring about and, concomitantly, wills to make a causal contribution that he knows with certainty will result in his chosen plan's being effected down to the last detail. 

This much is accepted by both Molina and the Bañezians. They further agree that it is because he is perfectly provident that God has comprehensive foreknowledge of what will occur in the created world. That is, God's speculative post-volitional knowledge of the created world -- his so-called free knowledge or knowledge of vision -- derives wholly from his pre-volitional knowledge and his knowledge of what he himself has willed to do. Unlike human knowers, God need not be acted upon by outside causes in order for his cognitive potentialities to be fully actualized; he does not have to, as it were, look outside himself in order to find out what his creative act has wrought. Rather, he knows 'in himself' what will happen precisely because he knows just what causal role he has freely chosen to play within the created order and because he knows just what will result given this causal contribution. In short, no contingent truth grasped by the knowledge of vision can be true prior to God's specifically intending or permitting it to be true or to his specifically willing to make the appropriate causal contribution toward its truth.

ADDENDUM 5/26/16:  I have just written up another article which argues further that the Molinist position is Augustinian and in accord with Catholic doctrine and that the Dominicans misunderstood it.

Also, this article by Fr. John Hardon contains a very helpful account of the Dominican-Molinist controversy and a very helpful description of the Molinist position and its nuances and various forms.

ADDENDUM 1/22/19:  Here is a summary of some of the main positions advocated in the Church on predestination and grace and the Church's attitude towards them.  The summary is from Pope Benedict XIV in 1748 in a letter to the Grand Inquisitor of Spain.  The Church's attitude towards these positions has not changed since that time.  The text is from Fr. John Hardon's article, History and Theology of Grace. Chapter VIII: Analysis of Efficacious Grace, found here (footnote 7 from text inserted into text).

You know there are manifold opinions in the schools on the famous questions about predestination and grace, and on the manner of reconciling human liberty with the omnipotence of God. The Thomists are said to be destroyers of human liberty and followers not only of Jansenism but of Calvinism. However, since they meet the charges with eminent satisfaction, and since their opinion has never been condemned by the Holy See, the Thomists carry on without hindrance in this matter, and it is not right for any ecclesiastical superior in the present state of affairs to force them to change their opinion. 

The Augustinians are reported as the followers of du Bay and of Jansenism. They represent themselves as defenders of human liberty, and strenuously answer their critics. Since their opinion, too, has not been condemned by the Holy See, no effort should therefore be made to compel them to give up their theory. 

The followers of Molina and Suarez are condemned by their adversaries as Semi-Pelagians. But the Roman Pontiffs have not passed judgment on the Molinist system, which they presently defend and may continue to do so.  (DS 2564)

ADDENDUM 4/16/19:  Further research seems to me to indicate that Arminius, the founder of the "Arminian" school of thought, held views similar to those of Molina, and so, like Molina, was not as bad as I had previously assumed.  For more, see here.

What Are the "Evangelical Counsels"?

The concept of the "evangelical counsels" is one that is virtually unknown to much of the Protestant world, since this is something that many Protestant groups did away with at the time of the Protestant Reformation.  This is a concept that I found quite surprising (and problematic) the first time I encountered it, and I had trouble figuring out how to assimilate it into my thinking as I was transitioning to Catholicism.  This is the aspect of Catholicism that gives us monks, nuns, monasteries, abbeys, hermits, etc.  Below I have tried to describe the concept in my own language.  Hopefully this will be helpful to others who are trying to get a clear and accurate view of the idea.

The biblical foundation for the idea of the evangelical counsels is found in such texts as 1 Corinthians 7 and Matthew 19:10-12.  In the latter text, Jesus has just taught his disciples that divorce is unlawful.  The disciples are quite surprised at this teaching:

His disciples say unto him, If the case of the man be so with his wife, it is not good to marry.  But he said unto them, All men cannot receive this saying, save they to whom it is given.  For there are some eunuchs, which were so born from their mother's womb: and there are some eunuchs, which were made eunuchs of men: and there be eunuchs, which have made themselves eunuchs for the kingdom of heaven's sake. He that is able to receive it, let him receive it.

In 1 Corinthians 7, Paul is giving commands and advice (counsel!) to the Corinthians regarding matters connected to marriage:

Now concerning the things whereof ye wrote unto me: It is good for a man not to touch a woman.  Nevertheless, to avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife, and let every woman have her own husband.  Let the husband render unto the wife due benevolence: and likewise also the wife unto the husband.  The wife hath not power of her own body, but the husband: and likewise also the husband hath not power of his own body, but the wife.  Defraud ye not one the other, except it be with consent for a time, that ye may give yourselves to fasting and prayer; and come together again, that Satan tempt you not for your incontinency.  But I speak this by permission, and not of commandment.  For I would that all men were even as I myself. But every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that.

I say therefore to the unmarried and widows, it is good for them if they abide even as I.  But if they cannot contain, let them marry: for it is better to marry than to burn. . . . 

But as God hath distributed to every man, as the Lord hath called every one, so let him walk. And so ordain I in all churches. . . . Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called. 

Now concerning virgins I have no commandment of the Lord: yet I give my judgment, as one that hath obtained mercy of the Lord to be faithful.  I suppose therefore that this is good for the present distress, I say, that it is good for a man so to be.  Art thou bound unto a wife? seek not to be loosed. Art thou loosed from a wife? seek not a wife.  But and if thou marry, thou hast not sinned; and if a virgin marry, she hath not sinned. Nevertheless such shall have trouble in the flesh: but I spare you.  But this I say, brethren, the time is short: it remaineth, that both they that have wives be as though they had none; and they that weep, as though they wept not; and they that rejoice, as though they rejoiced not; and they that buy, as though they possessed not; and they that use this world, as not abusing it: for the fashion of this world passeth away.

But I would have you without carefulness. He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord:  But he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.  There is difference also between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman careth for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit: but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband.  And this I speak for your own profit; not that I may cast a snare upon you, but for that which is comely, and that ye may attend upon the Lord without distraction.

But if any man think that he behaveth himself uncomely toward his virgin, if she pass the flower of her age, and need so require, let him do what he will, he sinneth not: let them marry.  Nevertheless he that standeth stedfast in his heart, having no necessity, but hath power over his own will, and hath so decreed in his heart that he will keep his virgin, doeth well.  So then he that giveth her in marriage doeth well; but he that giveth her not in marriage doeth better.

The wife is bound by the law as long as her husband liveth; but if her husband be dead, she is at liberty to be married to whom she will; only in the Lord.  But she is happier if she so abide, after my judgment: and I think also that I have the Spirit of God.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church deals with the evangelical counsels especially here (1973-1974 and here (914-933):

1973 Besides its precepts, the New Law also includes the evangelical counsels. The traditional distinction between God's commandments and the evangelical counsels is drawn in relation to charity, the perfection of Christian life. The precepts are intended to remove whatever is incompatible with charity. The aim of the counsels is to remove whatever might hinder the development of charity, even if it is not contrary to it.

1974 The evangelical counsels manifest the living fullness of charity, which is never satisfied with not giving more. They attest its vitality and call forth our spiritual readiness. The perfection of the New Law consists essentially in the precepts of love of God and neighbor. The counsels point out the more direct ways, the readier means, and are to be practiced in keeping with the vocation of each: 

The Catechism here (in 1974) adds a relevant quotation from St. Francis de Sales:

[God] does not want each person to keep all the counsels, but only those appropriate to the diversity of persons, times, opportunities, and strengths, as charity requires; for it is charity, as queen of all virtues, all commandments, all counsels, and, in short, of all laws and all Christian actions that gives to all of them their rank, order, time, and value.  (Footnotes removed here and above)

Here is my articulation, in my own words, of the basic idea:

The ultimate goal of our lives is the beatific vision, where we will enjoy God fully forever.  In this life, we are all called to live lives of charity--of supreme love to God, and love to our neighbors for God's sake.  The commandments of God lay out the specifics of how we are all called to live in the love of God.  Beyond the commandments of God's law are the evangelical counsels.  The counsels lay out a way to live a life especially and particularly devoted to God and to God's service.  There is the counsel of poverty, which calls individuals to abandon personal ownership of worldly possessions.  There is the counsel of chastity, which invites to the renunciation of married life.  And there is the counsel of obedience, in which we are invited to put ourselves in a special way under the authority and guidance of spiritual or ecclesiastical guides (such as by committing to a religious order).

Since the evangelical counsels portray a life which is lived in full, direct service to God and with a fuller focus on God than one would experience in other life callings, it can be said that, in a sense, the way of life proposed by the counsels is better than other forms of living.  The more we are able to live a life focused on God and in his direct service, the better, all other things being equal.  St. Paul alludes to this in his discussion of the counsel of chastity in 1 Corinthians 7:32-34:  "He that is unmarried careth for the things that belong to the Lord, how he may please the Lord:  But he that is married careth for the things that are of the world, how he may please his wife.  There is difference also between a wife and a virgin. The unmarried woman careth for the things of the Lord, that she may be holy both in body and in spirit: but she that is married careth for the things of the world, how she may please her husband."  The life pointed to by the counsels can also be called better in that it has the potential to free us more from worldly cares and distractions.  However, it is important to note that the counsels are not mandatory upon all, and it is not a sin to live other forms of life.  In fact, God has not called everyone to the full embracing of all of these counsels.  As St. Paul puts it (1 Corinthians 7:7), "every man hath his proper gift of God, one after this manner, and another after that."  God has given us all different gifts and callings, and the Church needs all of them.  An obvious example is marriage.  If everyone embraced celibacy, there would soon be no more Church on the earth at all!  And there are many works and activities that God calls men to that could not be fulfilled if everyone embraced the fullness of all the counsels.  The examples provided by those living other forms of life are important to the Church (marriage, for example, is a model of the relationship between Christ and the Church.)  Therefore, while in a general sense, all other things being equal, we can say that the life called for by the full profession of the counsels is in some ways better, this life is not necessarily better for every individual person, nor would it be better for the Church or for the world if everyone tried to live the fullness of all the counsels.  For some people, given their gifts, callings, talents, desires, personality, etc., it would not be best to choose to embrace all the counsels fully.  It could even be sinful, if it would involve abandoning the callings and gifts God has given for those he has not.  As the Catechism puts it (#1974), quoting St. Francis de Sales, "[God] does not want each person to keep all the counsels, but only those appropriate to the diversity of persons, times, opportunities, and strengths, as charity requires."  Other forms of life not involving a full living of all the counsels are also good and pleasing to God, and necessary to humanity and to the Church, and they should not be considered inferior as if they were something to be shunned or avoided.  Marriage, far from being denigrated, is even one of the seven sacraments!  While a life devoted fully to all of the evangelical counsels can be in a special way freed from worldly cares and distractions, yet it has its own cares and distractions, and other forms of life have their own special blessings and means of sanctification.

Nevertheless, even those who are not called to the full embracing of all the counsels might be called to some of them, or to some of them to some degree.  All of us are called to live out the spirit of them, as we live lives of full charity and devotion to God and his service in whatever way that makes sense to us in the peculiarities of God's individual call to each of us.  Maintaining closeness to God and devoting ourselves to his service is something all of us should strive towards more and more in the context of our individual vocations.

This is another helpful article on the counsels, from The British Province of Carmelite Friars.

Published, appropriately, on the feast of St. Agnes

ADDENDUM 6/17/16:  Pope Francis recently released an Apostolic Exhortation on marriage and family which devotes a short section to making the point that married life is not inferior to a life of celibacy.  Here is a brief selection from Amoris Laetitia (Chapter 4, pp. 117-119--I've moved footnotes to within the text itself in brackets):

159. Virginity is a form of love. As a sign, it speaks to us of the coming of the Kingdom and the need for complete devotion to the cause of the Gospel (cf. 1 Cor 7:32). It is also a reflection of the fullness of heaven, where “they neither marry not are given in marriage” (Mt 22:30). Saint Paul recommended virginity because he expected Jesus’ imminent return and he wanted everyone to concentrate only on spreading the Gospel: “the appointed time has grown very short” (1 Cor 7:29). Nonetheless, he made it clear that this was his personal opinion and preference (cf. 1 Cor 7:6-9), not something demanded by Christ: “I have no command in the Lord” (1 Cor 7:25). All the same, he recognized the value of the different callings: “Each has his or her own special gift from God, one of one kind and one of another” (1 Cor 7:7). Reflecting on this, Saint John Paul II noted that the biblical texts “give no reason to assert the ‘inferiority’ of marriage, nor the ‘superiority’ of virginity or celibacy” [Catechesis (14 April 1982), 1: Insegnamenti V/1 (1982), 1176.] based on sexual abstinence. Rather than speak absolutely of the superiority of virginity, it should be enough to point out that the different states of life complement one another, and consequently that some can be more perfect in one way and others in another. Alexander of Hales, for example, stated that in one sense marriage may be considered superior to the other sacraments, inasmuch as it symbolizes the great reality of “Christ’s union with the Church, or the union of his divine and human natures”. [Glossa in quatuor libros sententiarum Petri Lombardi, IV, XXVI, 2 (Quaracchi, 1957, 446).] 

160. Consequently, “it is not a matter of diminishing the value of matrimony in favour of continence”. [John Paul II, Catechesis (7 April 1982), 2: Insegnamenti V/1 (1982), 1127.] “There is no basis for playing one off against the other… If, following a certain theological tradition, one speaks of a ‘state of perfection’ (status perfectionis), this has to do not with continence in itself, but with the entirety of a life based on the evangelical counsels”. [Id., Catechesis (14 April 1982), 3: Insegnamenti V/1 (1982), 1177.] A married person can experience the highest degree of charity and thus “reach the perfection which flows from charity, through fidelity to the spirit of those counsels. Such perfection is possible and accessible to every man and woman”. [Ibid.]

Also, the Franciscan Media Saint of the Day blurb on St. Francis de Sales has a nice quotation from him making a similar point:

It is an error, or rather a heresy, to say devotion is incompatible with the life of a soldier, a tradesman, a prince, or a married woman.... It has happened that many have lost perfection in the desert who had preserved it in the world.

Some Concerns about Anglicanism

During our transition period (Summer of 2015) as we were deciding whether or not to become Catholic, I had some correspondence with some others who were considering Anglicanism, and those conversations helped me as I was trying to wade through the merits of the claims of the various Christian traditions--Presbyterianism, Anglicanism, Orthodoxy, Catholicism, etc.  In the context of that conversation, I wrote out some concerns I have regarding Anglicanism.  I've already posted these elsewhere on the blog, but I wanted to give them their own post as well.  There are two parts to what is laid out below, corresponding to two different emails I wrote.  The main problems with Anglicanism I deal with are how Anglicanism can justify itself as a "break-off" denomination--that is, as a new institution coming into being in the sixteenth century by means of breaking off from a previously-accepted Roman Catholic Church and tradition--and my observation that Anglicanism seems to take a "have your cake and eat it too" mentality when it comes to how to think about the authority of Scripture and tradition.  They like to see themselves, sometimes, as having a more sophisticated version of Sola Scriptura than other Protestants (like Presbyterians), but I question whether there is really anything there besides rhetorical fluff.

Since these were written as emails, they sometimes use the second person to address those to whom I was writing.

For more on similar issues and on criticisms of Anglicanism, see here and here.  Also, while I'm here, I should mention that another Protestant who has taken an approach to Sola Scriptura similar to Anglicanism is Keith Mathison.  He has written a number of things trying to show that one of the major Catholic objections to Sola Scriptura--that it makes us ultimately to rely on our own personal interpretations of Scripture over and against the rest of the Church--is a straw-man argument, and that Sola Scriptura doesn't in fact throw us back onto an ultimate reliance on personal interpretation.  Here is an example of his writing.  Here is an excellent response to it from the Catholic point of view, showing, I think very well, clearly, and conclusively, that Mathison's distinction between a more sophisticated "Sola Scriptura" and a sillier, more individualistic "Solo Scriptura" has no real substance to it, but that Mathison's position is really just a way of articulating Sola Scriptura that tries (not necessarily intentionally, of course) to mask the ultimate reliance on personal interpretation of the Bible that Sola Scriptura necessarily implies.

Part I

So here's my two main concerns with Anglicanism at this point:

1. The view of the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church, and what I take to be the pretty much unanimous view of the early church fathers, is that the church Christ founded was not just a loose, informal connection of Christians or individual churches, but was a unified visible body consisting of Christians in communion with their bishops and the bishops in communion with each other. One could be a part of this body, or one could break off from it (by, for example, rebelling against a legitimate ecumenical council). This view can be clearly seen throughout the fathers, such as in Cyprian's famous treatise and Augustine's treatise on the unity of the church. The fathers, and the Catholic and Orthodox churches, also held and hold that Christ gave the Holy Spirit to this church in such a way that it would never fall away such as to create a need for faithful men to break from it and form a new church, a new "denomination."

I think a good case for this position can be made from Scripture. Throughout the Old Testament, God's people often went astray, but there was never any time when the faithful were called to separate from the established denominational body of Israel and form a new body. God actually proposed this once to Moses as a test, and he rejected it. However, the coming of Christ did bring such a break. This is discussed clearly in Jesus's parable of the vinedressers (Matthew 21:33-46). The Jewish leaders failed to preserve, and so finally, after thousands of years, God authorized a break from the Jewish denomination. God would raise up a new nation, with new leaders, who would break from the old and do things right where the old nation had failed. (And even then, God promised that the cutting off of the Jews would be temporary, and they would be restored at the end.) This new nation--the Christian church--would not fail as Israel had failed, because they would have the Holy Spirit in a new way who would preserve them. They are the people of the New Covenant, which succeeds because it brings a power the Old Covenant did not possess. The gates of hell will never prevail against the church (as they did, at least temporarily, against Israel), for God has given the keys to Peter and to the apostles. Therefore, there will never need to be a denominational break with the original denomination of the church as there was a break with the Jewish denomination. All of this would be common fare for the church fathers.

My "default argument" in the original thing I sent to you all argued that because we are commanded to preserve the unity of the church and submit to the leaders of the church, we ought not to break that unity or rebel against those leaders unless we have good, conclusive reasons to do so. That is, we should not form a new denomination unless there is good, conclusive reason to do so. But the churches which have a plausible claim to be the original denomination (particularly the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox churches) hold the ideas I've just articulated above, so that to reject those ideas would require a break from these churches. (There are also the other earlier churches to consider, such as the Oriental Orthodox--but I need to do more research on these before saying too much about them.)

The Anglican church is clearly a new "denomination," started in the sixteenth century. I know they claim to be the recovery of the early church, but the fact remains that they are obviously not denominationally the same body as the early church. The Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox churches are organically descended denominationally from the early church--that is, if we stay with the early catholic church through ongoing history and don't break denominationally from it, we end up with the Roman Catholic and the Eastern Orthodox churches. We don't end up with the Anglican church, because, as a distinct denominational body, it came into existence in the sixteenth century by breaking off of the Roman Catholic Church. So, if it is the case that we ought not to break denominationally with the early church, we will have to be either Roman Catholic or Eastern Orthodox (though, again, we also need to think of the Oriental Orthodox, etc.). If Anglicanism can provide a conclusive reason justifying such a break, so be it. But if they can't, we shouldn't follow them out of Roman Catholicism. (It is helpful to avoid personal provincialism in thinking through these issues. Since Anglicanism came out of Roman Catholicism, if we are going to be Anglicans we should think of ourselves as breaking off from Roman Catholicism. We should ask ourselves if we would have followed the Anglicans out of the RC church or not at the time. If we wouldn't think it justified then, it cannot be more justified now, even though it might be easier to consider since we don't have to personally go through a break from a former church. I think it would alter the perceptions of a lot of Protestants if, instead of provincially taking their Protestantism as a given, they came to think of themselves as having broken off from a previous church and so had to justify to themselves their reasons for breaking off.) I don't think the Anglicans can provide a sufficient justification for breaking the unity of the church or renouncing obedience to the Roman Catholic Church. (Remember, the bishops of the Church of England became bishops partly by submitting to Rome--that was a part of their commitment. So when they broke off, they renounced something they had previous sworn to. Before the break, they acknowledged that their authority was conditional upon their remaining in communion with Rome--this was understood by all sides when they were ordained.  Thus, in continuing to claim authority after the break, they had to go back on what they had previously acknowledged and create an argument for themselves as to why they still had authority even though they had abandoned the previously acknowledged basis of their authority. In some ways, then, it is kind of like a manager of a local Walmart deciding to ignore headquarters, being stripped of his authority by headquarters, but instead of giving up the authority creating a new foundation for it in order to justify continuing to claim to be the manager. This doesn't in itself prove they were wrong--after all, if they were doing God's will, surely they were justified--but I think it helps to realize just how radical their break was and how much the default lay in staying with Rome and not breaking off. It does seem to me that Anglicans sometimes whitewash that too much--not necessarily intentionally, of course.)

So, in short, I don't think Anglicanism can adequately justify forming a new denomination in the sixteenth century.

2. I am concerned that Anglican epistemology is self-referentially inconsistent and self-refuting. I think it shares this problem with the Eastern Orthodox. Anglicanism seems to me to be a bit confused as to what its foundational system of authority is. Is Scripture alone infallible, or is the early catholic tradition infallible as well? If it is Scripture alone, that is the Sola Scriptura position, and my response to that then would be that I don't think they can justify their distinctive positions or existence adequately from Scripture alone (including justifying Sola Scriptura from Scripture alone). But sometimes Anglicans talk as if something like the "nearly unanimous consent of the early fathers" is also infallible, such that it could not be wrong and so cannot be disagreed with--you're definitely wrong if you go against it. When speaking in this vein, the Anglican claim seems (often) to be something like this: The tradition shared by the whole of the early church is infallible, but since the times of the early church the Catholic Church has broken into (at least) three main branches--the Roman Catholics, the Eastern Orthodox, and the Anglicans. All three of these together constitute the Catholic Church, and none of them alone constitute the Catholic Church. To illustrate this, the guy on the Anglican podcast I've been listening to talked about ordaining women as priests. He said that the Anglican church should not make that change because the Anglican church should not make decisions and changes like that unilaterally, but only with the agreement of the rest of the Catholic Church--the Roman Catholics and the Orthodox.

Now, here's the problem: The Anglican distinctives, including their "branch theory" of the church and their distinctive way of deciding theological truth, in short all the things that make them Anglicans and not Roman Catholics or Eastern Orthodox, were never a part of the unanimous consent of the early church and are not today agreed upon by the other two supposed branches of the Catholic Church. So, according to their own epistemology, these things should not be embraced and insisted upon. But Anglicans have obviously embraced and insisted upon them to such an extent as to form a new denomination in the sixteenth century and to have continued to exist in separation from the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox churches down to the present day. In short, the Anglicans say, "As Anglicans, we believe we should only hold to and insist on those things that the whole early church held to and which are unanimously agreed upon by all three branches of the Catholic Church today," while Anglicanism itself is something neither the whole early church agreed upon nor do the other two alleged branches of the Catholic Church today (or ever in their history). (In fact, it seems evident to me that the Anglican branch theory of the church and their epistemology were embraced by virtually no one in the early church. The early church unanimously repudiated anything like the branch theory, all holding to the impossibility of the dissolution of the visible unity of the Catholic Church, and they all seemed to hold that the church was guided by God infallibly such that there would never need to be a "reform" of the church requiring a break from all presently-existing churches in order to "recover" the lost tradition of the orthodox church.)

In short, if Anglicans should not embrace and insist upon distinctives that cannot be proved to be biblical, or were not held by the whole of the early church, and they should not go beyond what the three current branches of the Catholic Church agree to today, then they should not be Anglicans and there should be no Anglican Church. That is what I mean by saying their epistemology is self-refuting. The Eastern Orthodox do something similar. They say that the infallible tradition of the church (which they hold, along with Roman Catholics, to be something that God continues beyond the days of the early church) is to be found in the opinions/teachings of the whole Catholic Church, and they complain against Rome for doing things without them. But the problem is that the distinctives of Eastern Orthodoxy (such as over against Roman Catholicism) have never been agreed upon by the whole Catholic Church, and so their own epistemology undermines itself. They cannot provide any reason from within their own system as to why we should believe in their system. (They're actually generally up-front about that in my experience, often admitting that they really don't have a clear worked-out way of telling how true doctrine is determined. When you complain about it, they accuse you of being "too rationalistic"--a good way of deflecting attention away from the problem. :-) ) My impression thus far--though I need to do more research on this--is that the Oriental Orthodox and other early groups (like the Nestorians) are in basically the same epistemological position. The only church that isn't is the Roman Catholic Church. They have a clearly worked-out way in their system of determining who to follow when not everyone agrees on something (while the other groups seem just to want to ignore the problem and pretend it isn't there)--you stick with the Bishop of Rome. They can make a plausible biblical case for this, or at least show a plausible biblical foundation for it in the keys being given to Peter in the gospels, etc. (I don't mean to say it can be proven conclusively only from Scripture, but only that there is at least a plausible foundation for it.) Their position goes back as far as we have records in the early church. It has apparently always been advocated for by Rome, and is often, throughout early church history, advocated for by many others as well, including many eastern bishops who are the ancestors of the modern Eastern Orthodox or other eastern churches. (See here for some examples.) There really was no other system of deciding disputes between bishops that was systematically or clearly worked out in the early church besides the Roman one, which many explicitly subscribed to and which is arguably often played out in the practice of the early churches. (There were certainly some who opposed the Roman view, but not as many as you might think--Fermillian being probably the earliest and one of the most vigorous opponents.)

Anyway, those are probably my two biggest concerns with Anglicans, and some of my central reasons for favoring Roman Catholicism. My default argument leads me to want to remain denominationally connected with the original denomination unless there is a good reason not to, and I don't think there is. The churches that can claim to be that denomination affirm a view of the church in which there are never to be breaks from it to form new denominations because it is ever guided by the Holy Spirit to not fail. Among these churches, only Rome has a self-consistent epistemology and a worked-out biblical and theological foundation for its own position.

Part II

This is a useful article for explaining the Anglican point of view. [The article referred to is here.] As such, it provides a nice foundation for some questions to be asked and some critique.

Here is the definition of Sola Scriptura given in the Westminster Confession:

"The Supreme Judge, by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture."

The key idea is that Scripture alone is infallible, and so it is the supreme standard. We should listen to the theologians of the church, we should listen to the church fathers, we should listen to the councils, etc., but we should not trust them implicitly because they are not infallible but should ultimately rest in the judgment of the Scriptures.

It seems to me that your article agrees with this, but also says things that contradict it or call it into question. So I wonder if it is coherent. (I've noticed this coherence issue in lots of other Anglican stuff I have seen). The article says this: "Anglicanism uniquely asserts the authority of all three sources of authority while maintaining that scripture holds the highest place, leaving open the possibility for error in the teaching of the Church or even errors in the interpretation of the Fathers, but not in the Bible." But then it also says things like this: "It would be wrong to say that Protestants universally do not turn to the Fathers, since many of them do, particularly those schooled in the Lutheran and Reformed traditions, but most Protestants do not see the Fathers as an authority, certainly not as one that trumps what the Holy Spirit might be saying to the individual believer or even what the Spirit might be saying to an individual church."

Let's think about this for a minute. If the Bible alone is infallible, then how much can I trust the church fathers? Can I take them very seriously? Yes. Should I be counseled by them? Yes. Should I be suspicious of my own Scriptural interpretations when they go against what many fathers have said? Yes. Should I trust the fathers implicitly when they say something I cannot see proved in Scripture? Wouldn't the answer here be no? If the fathers can be wrong, maybe they are wrong sometimes! Maybe they are wrong altogether sometimes. Fads can get established that can bring consensuses even when there is no good basis for them. For example, take the sign of the cross. All the fathers say we should do that. They all think it is a non-negotiable apostolic tradition (and they all think there are such things as non-negotiable apostolic traditions--see Basil's thoughts in Chapter 27 of his book here). But how do we know that this didn't originate in the second century or even as a custom in the first century but without any apostolic command, and so it should not be considered a divine requirement (contrary to the fathers' view)? It is not absurd to think that this might have happened. So what do we do? Do we command it (following the fathers) or not? It seems to me that, if the Bible alone is infallible, if we follow this custom and require it, we are adding to the commands of God on a flimsy basis (because we really don't have any good reason to think that the practice is apostolic, considering the other plausible possibilities--after all, Tertullian said that it was an apostolic tradition that people shouldn't take a bath for a week after being baptized and that everyone knew it, but nobody so far as I know believes that today). This is why I feel that Sola Scriptura leads much more naturally to something like Presbyterianism than to Anglicanism--to a minimalist approach to worship, etc. I didn't hold that view because I didn't care about tradition or the fathers, but because I didn't consider them infallible. The article says the authority of the fathers trumps the individual's interpretation of Scripture, but I don't see how that makes any sense on the assumption that the Bible is infallible but the fathers are not. I do see how it would make sense to defer to the fathers, in the sense of being suspicious of one's ideas when they are contrary to them; but if, in the end, after as much careful research, prayer, and thought as possible, it really seems that the Bible goes one way and the fathers another, wouldn't we go with the Bible if the Bible is infallible and the father's aren't? Wouldn't we have to go with our own interpretations, since the only alternative is to trust implicitly in those who are not to be implicitly trusted? To trust in the fathers implicitly is to treat them exactly the same as if they are infallible.

I really don't see how the Anglican position on the authority of Scripture in principle differs at all from that of the Westminster Confession. I think the idea of "Protestantism" the author describes is largely a myth invented by Anglicans who want to be distinct. Yes, sure, there are lots of uninformed Protestants who just go with "my Bible and me" in a superficial sense, but I am not aware of any Protestant tradition that would deny that great deference should be given to the fathers and church tradition. You've just read Jason Wallace's response to me. Did you notice that he told me I'd misunderstood Sola Scriptura because it doesn't mean to ignore church tradition, etc.? There's a Presbyterian telling me the same thing the Anglicans say. (And I already know it, despite everyone's insistence that I don't! That seems to be one of Sola Scriptura's main lines of defense--deny that anyone understands it so that it can escape all critique.) Everyone thinks we should defer to the fathers. Calvin was a great patristic scholar. You'll not find a more patristically-rooted book than Calvin's or Turretin's Institutes. Anglicans just aren't special here like they think they are. What seems to be special about Anglicans is that they want to have their cake and eat it too in this area. They want to affirm the Bible alone as infallible, but then to treat the fathers (or rather their own ideas of what "the fathers say" which disagrees with other people's ideas about what they say) as infallible anyway (when it suits them). The Reformed tradition is, I think, more consistent--they affirm that the Bible alone is infallible and then they actually act that way by not putting implicit trust in traditions that can't be proved from Scripture. Again, that's why they tend to be more minimalistic in worship. Or take another example: the role of bishop. It seems to me pretty indisputable that the Bible does not distinguish between bishops and elders. The terms are interchangeable (in terms of describing an office). That's why I held to presbyterian church government--episcopalian government separates bishops and elders (presbyters, priests) into two offices and puts one over the other without adequate biblical warrant. The episcopalians can claim a long tradition, going back to Ignatius of Antioch, but how do they know that their view has apostolic warrant? It may be that the apostles appointed only elders/bishops, but that soon afterwards it become customary to make a bishop above the elders. How do we know that was right? Just because the whole church quickly came to accept it in the second century doesn't prove they were right; people can go wrong in such ways easily enough.  The Catholic position, of course, is that God guided the church infallibly to develop its government, but I don't see how that option is open to Anglicans. It seems it is only an open option if we grant infallible guidance to the tradition of the church, but that would contradict the Anglican belief that only the Bible is infallible. Anglicans can't very well affirm an infallible guidance of the church and its tradition because that would obviously knock them out of having any right to exist, for they are a break-off that has to insist the whole church went astray to justify their existence. If God guided the Catholic Church infallibly, they would have to have remained Catholic. Again, it seems to me that wanting to have one's cake and eat it too is a good description of the Anglican ethos overall--they want to be Catholic and have the traditions, the sense of continuity, etc., but they don't want to submit to the Catholic Church and so are forced to adopt something like Sola Scriptura and be Protestant. So they end up trying to force the two together unnaturally and incoherently. (Of course, I'm talking as if there is any actual coherent thing called "Anglicanism." I'm skeptical that there actually is, since there seems to be no universal, official Anglican view of what Anglicanism actually is--the groups you guys like differ from other parts of the Anglican movement.)

ADDEMDUM 1/18/16:  I just wrote up another response to someone today asking my opinion of Keith Mathison's position on Sola Scriptura (which is basically the same as the Anglican desire to "have their cake and eat it too" in terms of the authority of Scripture and tradition).  I thought my main criticism came out pretty well, so I thought I'd paste it here:

What articulations like Keith Mathison's seem designed to avoid, however, is the recognition that when all is said and done, when we've done all our research, listened to the traditions, the Fathers, the councils, and the theologians, our ultimate reliance has to be on our own personal biblical interpretations.  Sola Scriptura must mean that if the whole church thinks the Bible says X, but, after extremely careful consideration I am convinced it says Y, I have to go with Y over X.  I have to go with my own interpretation over everyone else's.  The only alternative to this is to put implicit faith in the traditions of the church, to treat them as if they are infallible, which is to give up Scripture as the sole ultimate rule of faith.  People like Keith Mathison seem to want to have their cake and eat it too--affirm Sola Scriptura, while at the same time refusing to own up to the full implications of it.

In the end, I think that Sola Scriptura cannot end up doing anything different than its founder, Martin Luther, did, who was prepared to stake everything on his own personal interpretation of Scripture, no matter what popes or councils or Church Fathers or traditions or historic customs opposed him.

ADDENDUM 6/30/16:  See this dialogue concerning the claims of Anglicanism I have just written up.