The root of protestant division

I've been reading Book 4, chapter 7 of The Institutes of the Christian Religion, in which John Calvin offers a brief history of the Roman bishop's claim to sovereignty over the universal Church. Perhaps that has led me to reflect on Church history in general, and the Great Schism in particular.

With many more thoughtful Roman Catholics, I regret that one effect of the Protestant Reformation was a division of the visible Church into various distinct, and often competing, branches. However, I cannot agree with the solution to that division proposed by many of the same Roman Catholics (particularly those with the zeal of recent conversion to the cause): namely, reunification with the Roman Catholic Church. These tend to paint division as a protestant disease, one which can easily be cured by submission to the pontiff in Rome.

This strikes me as a rather convenient failure to remember Church history, and in particular the division between East and West which passed its point of no return in 1054 A.D. This Wikipedia article is a reasonably fair and accurate summary, and helps us see this separation is no more or less substantive than the separations between Protestant traditions: disagreements over worship styles, forms of Church government, and rather technical theological points. The Great Schism is the Church's move away from her original constitution as a visibly universal Church to her modern existence as a fragmented body whose parts are more concerned to preserve their particular attributes and strengths than to submit themselves to the concerns of either the other parts or the whole.

In other words, protestant division is not alien to Roman Catholicism, but intrinsic to the post-1054 character of Rome (and Eastern Orthodoxy, for that matter). Peculiarly, Roman Catholicism continues to recommend as a cure for division precisely that which led to the Great Schism: universal submission to the papacy. For Protestantism, this is anathema, while for Eastern Orthodoxy it is primarily distasteful. Why, then, does Rome continue to insist on it? To this Protestant, it seems Rome would prefer division to surrendering its false claims of supremacy.

Schism is the great sinful legacy of the Protestant Reformation, and I agree with our Roman Catholic critics that Protestantism is unnecessarily divided against itself. But to the extent that is so, we are merely following a tradition inherited from our time sojourning in Rome after 1054. The root of Protestant division is in the Church's Roman Catholic history, and today's Roman bishop would have far more credibility when he makes ecumenical pronouncements if he were actively seeking to root it out.

The New Noncomformist Conscience

Over at the First Things website, Helen Andrews examines the recent trend of "shame campaigns" against those who do not hold to the recently established establishment line on homosexual marriage by offering a brief history of similar efforts in Great Britain in the 19th century, along with a helpful discussion of why they defeat the Church's Gospel agenda but may very well be the essence of "cultural progressivism." Recommended.

Regarding the authorship of Psalms 74 & 79

Psalms 74 and 79 are attributed to Asaph, which is a wee bit awkward given their subject matter. Both of these psalms reflect on the devastation suffered by Judah prior to the Babylonian Exile, with particular attention paid to the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple in 587 B.C. However, Asaph the musician was a contemporary of King David (1 Chronicles 6:39 & 9:15), and so died long before those events.

One solution to this problem would be to assert the titles of Psalms were added long after they were composed by the scribes who compiled the Psalter, and ought not be taken as part of inspired Scripture. However, this theory assumes those scribes knew less about Biblical history than I do, an assumption which I think unlikely (i.e., wouldn't they also have noticed Asaph couldn't have written on these subjects?). Furthermore, the particular view of canonicity to which I subscribe holds that everything in the Bible is there because God wants it there, even if it was added by a later scribe. In other words, I don't believe we can say the Psalter is mostly inspired, but with some uninspired bits floating around.

I do believe there were some scribes who did editorial work on most, if not all, of the Old Testament, and, even if they are anonymous, they are its authors along with all the prophets whose names we use as book titles. Because of Psalm 78, I think they might have done some revising of Psalms 74 and 79.

Psalm 78 is a sketch of Israel's history from the Exodus to the reign of David. It builds toward the Philistine capture of the Ark of the Covenant as a sign of God's wrath toward and rejection of Israel, and as such paints the events recorded in 1 Samuel 4 in extreme, apocalyptic terms: sword, fire, widowhood. There is nothing in Psalm 78 which would put it later than Asaph's lifetime, and thus we have no reason to reject his authorship of it. I suggest Psalms 74 and 79 were also written by Asaph as theological and spiritual reflections on the Ark's capture, but later generations of scribes found them such appropriate expressions of the destruction of the Babylonian Exile that they rewrote those Psalms to more directly address that experience. In other words, Asaph wrote original versions of Psalms 74 and 79 which were later edited and revised by others.

This theory may be supported by the parallels between Psalm 79:6-7 and Jeremiah 10:25, which are very nearly identical. An editor who rewrote Psalm 79:1-4 to fit 587 B.C. may have thought Jeremiah's plea that the Lord judge the nations rather than Judah would fit very well after Psalm 79:5's question, "How long, O Lord?"

Of course, there's no way to prove a theory of this sort, and even if I'm right, there's also no way to know what portions of Psalms 74 and 79 were original to Asaph and what came from his editors. As with all of Scripture, however, we can rest assured that the Psalms we have are the ones the Lord inspired for the upbuilding of his Church.

Because political parties matter

Although he doesn't mention political parties in his insightful commentary piece "How to Survive Demonization," Peter Spiliakos tells us why they should be rebuilt in principle, and why conservatives must rebuild them in practice. Two quotes:

 It is very difficult—and perhaps impossible—for any candidate-centered strategy to build an enduring connection with the right-leaning but left-voting electorate. Campaigns are too short, and the relationship built during those campaigns will prove too tenuous.

The right’s problem with right-leaning Democratic voters is not weak candidates. The problem is weak relationships, and the challenge is building these relationships so that America is ready to listen to the right conservative with the right agenda. 

Instead of selecting candidates who further their agendas, the Republican and Democratic parties have surrendered control of their agendas to charismatic individuals who are able to win primary elections. Unfortunately, while an individual may have a compelling vision, only a group of individuals working cooperatively (such as a Church council or a political party) can craft an agenda for an even larger group of individuals (such as a Church or a nation). Sadly, conservatives have let a myopic focus on winning the election immediately before them prevent them from pursuing strategies which might allow them to reliably win elections year after succeeding year.

Regarding "Regarding 'A Critic of Contemporary Christian Music Reviews the OPC Psalter-Hymnal'"

A postscript to my recent post, Regarding "A Critic of Contemporary Christian Music Reviews the OPC Psalter-Hymnal," in which I mentioned the song "Shine, Jesus, Shine:" at our presbytery's recent Bible camp, a college student said she'd never heard of it, and someone else described it to her as "an old song."

Proof positive that the debate over worship music has passed my generation by.

Regarding "A Critic of Contemporary Christian Music Reviews the OPC Psalter-Hymnal"

Given my inclination to advocate for singing Psalms in worship, several persons have asked why I ran B. Censorious's "A Critic of Contemporary Christian Music Reviews the OPC Psalter-Hymnal." Simply put, I thought it a fine example of the "criticizing worsip music" genre of which reformed writers of the last several decades seem so fond, and further thought it would be a shame were I the only one to enjoy it.

When I first began reading works of this genre a couple decades ago, it occurred to me that many of the criticisms leveled against whatever kind of worship song the writer did not like (whether classic hymns or contemporary worship music) were presented as though they were careful theological conclusions despite the writer failing to give Scriptural backing for his arguments, and I wondered whether these were actually expressions of aesthetic and personal preference. It further seemed to me that the Psalms themselves could be faulted along the same lines that, say, "Shine, Jesus, Shine" is so widely criticized. In that light, Mr. Censorious's review article represents the natural conclusion of a reflexive urge to condemn uninspired worship songs.

I do believe there are any number of reasons to reject songs of any vintage as inappropriate for Christian worship. At the same time, I believe those who are quick to reject songs ought to be sure none of their reasons for so doing could not equally well be applied to the Psalter.

A generational vision from Psalm 78:2-4

I will open my mouth in a parable;
I will utter dark sayings from of old, 
  things that we have heard and known,
that our fathers have told us. 
  We will not hide them from their children,
but tell to the coming generation
the glorious deeds of the LORD, and his might,
and the wonders that he has done. (Psalm 78:2-4)

Asaph calls us to pass on the traditions received from "our fathers," by which he means not only his own personal ancestors, but all the previous generations of Israel (a general Old Testament assumption, but particularly the case in Psalm 78). Interestingly, the traditions are to be passed on to "their children" rather than "our children." In other words, "the coming generation" should be considered the children of our ancestors in the Church: our children do not belong to us so much as they belong to the Church, and we are primarily conduits who connect all the children in the Church to all the saints who have gone before them.

A number of years ago now, I was struck by an elder in my presbytery who frequently said that we need "a generational vision," by which he meant, at least as far as I could tell, that Christians should order their lives and practice so that our descendants will maintain the faith. I agree with that proposition, so far as it goes, but if it only goes so far as one's own children and their children, it seems to me remarkably deficient. Asaph's generational vision moves not only forward in time, but backwards as well, to all who have come before us. A Biblical generational vision encompasses every prior generation of faithful Church members and all the children of the Church today and tomorrow.