The angelic doctor, Thomas, touches on something important with his
beati in regno coelestia videnbunt poenas domnatorum, ut beatitudo illis magis complaceat, [The blessed in the kingdom of heaven will see the punishments of the damned, in order that their bliss be more delightful to them, STIII Suppl Q94, Art1, tr. Clark and Swensen; i.e it's quite literal]
which I first came across in Nietzsche's Geneology. There is something, well, barbaric about this strain of "hallowed" Christian tradition, a strain quite alive today.
But then what's an exclusivist to say? Does the end of the damned torment the saved--the lost brother, mother, sister, father, spouse, friend? That wouldn't be much of a salvation. Nor would it seem fitting for them to be neutral about it, shrugging their shoulders as it were with a heavenly "Oh well." Sure, CS Lewis (The Great Divorce) might say that the damned should not have the power to torment the saved--but that's a dodge; the question is not one of the damned actively causing sorrow in the saved. Even if the pain and sorrow were, say, merely supererogatory, still it would be a surprise to hear all of the saved always feel neither pain nor joy at the fate of the damned.
Then what? Maybe God "damns the memories" of the lost, so that memories of them are wiped clean from the saved. Is that metaphysically possible though? That is, one could make a strong case that the Augustinean "inner man" would not survive such a mutilation intact, at least in some cases, e.g. where a parent or child or spouse is damned.
And if it were possible, would that be the kind of act God would have recourse to, even if it were permissible? That's a tough question, of course: God is free, free, free. But that is enough perhaps for a seed of doubt about exclusivism, no?
Scriptural Authority: A Test Case
Here's Paul, or perhaps some member(s) of his group, in I Tim. 2:
12I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. 13For Adam was formed first, then Eve; 14and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. 15Yet she will be saved through childbearing, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.
"Continue in faith" might be contrued from the earlier passage:
3This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, 4who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5Forthere is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind,Christ Jesus, himself human, 6 who gave himself a ransom for all—this was attested at the right time.
That's a quick summary of the kerygma. Moreover, my NRSV source tells me "woman" might well refer to wives, and "man" to husbands. On a plain sense/grammatical reading with a little splash of lower criticism from my NRSV editors, I Timothy implies faith, even with love et al, is insufficient for the salvation of a wife. That is, a woman who gets married and does not bear a child is damned. It's not just a sin; salvation itself seems precluded, as if a necessary condition were being denied. Logically, this might be regimented:
for any wife x, if x is saved, then x continues in faith, ..., and bears a child.
Further, "bear a child" has a plain sense here which, taken strictly, excludes C-sections--something which could not have been intended by Paul or his school. Indeed, the text, namely
11Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. 12I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. 13For Adam was formed first, then Eve; 14and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.
alludes to the Genesis creation stories, setting a context for verse 15. It seems wives are obliged to bear children, suffering the curse from Genesis on childbearing. To bear children while evading the curse seems to be a sin, a sin of such magnitude the wife's salvation is endangered, even lost if she does not have at least one child "the natural way." One imagines I Tim. would have quite sternly disapproved of pain medication for childbearing wives.
II.
Of course, my exegesis is ridiculous. I suppose one might "bite the bullet" and insist that I did get it right, and what seems like foolishness to degraded "Greeks" like me is holy wisdom from God; I just don't have the ears to hear it. But that seems farfetched, even in view of Scripture itself. One would have expected such a condition to show up in other discussions of salvation prima facie giving necessary conditions; that it does not show up counts decisively against my plain sense reading. Suppose my reading is off somehow; well, what went wrong?
Maybe I missed the plain sense, particulary in how I regimented the text above. I'd like to see a plausible plain sense alternative respecting the cognitive and expressive limits of the author(s). Perhaps contrary plain sense readings would stretch the plain sense of "plain sense," bringing in covert, speculative opinions to defuse what otherwise seems incredible.
Or maybe I did not miss the plain sense--maybe I expressed roughly what the human author(s) intended while writing at the time--but what the author(s) intended is not the Scriptural significance that God would wish one to take away from the text. In other words, perhaps the human author(s) made an instructive mistake, as Plato seems to have portrayed Socrates making instructive mistakes (e.g. at the end of Republic I). Thus, mistakes would not invalidate the text, but would partially constitute its validity; we are supposed to know better on the basis of more important scriptural principles gleaned elsewhere, like in verses 5-6. The plain sense would not necessarily be the sense Scripture carries.
My point: any method of interpretation that cannot handle this passage is incomplete. Can the Separatists, who are committed to a plain sense hermeneutic, handle it? I'm not sure: maybe a skilled pen could produce a plausible exegesis.
12I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. 13For Adam was formed first, then Eve; 14and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. 15Yet she will be saved through childbearing, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.
"Continue in faith" might be contrued from the earlier passage:
3This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Saviour, 4who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. 5Forthere is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind,Christ Jesus, himself human, 6 who gave himself a ransom for all—this was attested at the right time.
That's a quick summary of the kerygma. Moreover, my NRSV source tells me "woman" might well refer to wives, and "man" to husbands. On a plain sense/grammatical reading with a little splash of lower criticism from my NRSV editors, I Timothy implies faith, even with love et al, is insufficient for the salvation of a wife. That is, a woman who gets married and does not bear a child is damned. It's not just a sin; salvation itself seems precluded, as if a necessary condition were being denied. Logically, this might be regimented:
for any wife x, if x is saved, then x continues in faith, ..., and bears a child.
Further, "bear a child" has a plain sense here which, taken strictly, excludes C-sections--something which could not have been intended by Paul or his school. Indeed, the text, namely
11Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. 12I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. 13For Adam was formed first, then Eve; 14and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor.
alludes to the Genesis creation stories, setting a context for verse 15. It seems wives are obliged to bear children, suffering the curse from Genesis on childbearing. To bear children while evading the curse seems to be a sin, a sin of such magnitude the wife's salvation is endangered, even lost if she does not have at least one child "the natural way." One imagines I Tim. would have quite sternly disapproved of pain medication for childbearing wives.
II.
Of course, my exegesis is ridiculous. I suppose one might "bite the bullet" and insist that I did get it right, and what seems like foolishness to degraded "Greeks" like me is holy wisdom from God; I just don't have the ears to hear it. But that seems farfetched, even in view of Scripture itself. One would have expected such a condition to show up in other discussions of salvation prima facie giving necessary conditions; that it does not show up counts decisively against my plain sense reading. Suppose my reading is off somehow; well, what went wrong?
Maybe I missed the plain sense, particulary in how I regimented the text above. I'd like to see a plausible plain sense alternative respecting the cognitive and expressive limits of the author(s). Perhaps contrary plain sense readings would stretch the plain sense of "plain sense," bringing in covert, speculative opinions to defuse what otherwise seems incredible.
Or maybe I did not miss the plain sense--maybe I expressed roughly what the human author(s) intended while writing at the time--but what the author(s) intended is not the Scriptural significance that God would wish one to take away from the text. In other words, perhaps the human author(s) made an instructive mistake, as Plato seems to have portrayed Socrates making instructive mistakes (e.g. at the end of Republic I). Thus, mistakes would not invalidate the text, but would partially constitute its validity; we are supposed to know better on the basis of more important scriptural principles gleaned elsewhere, like in verses 5-6. The plain sense would not necessarily be the sense Scripture carries.
My point: any method of interpretation that cannot handle this passage is incomplete. Can the Separatists, who are committed to a plain sense hermeneutic, handle it? I'm not sure: maybe a skilled pen could produce a plausible exegesis.
Radner's Fallacy
I. Radner's Case
In a recent piece for ACI, Radner argues that our HoB should prescind from disciplining Bishop Duncan. In it, Radner, who, appointed by Williams himself, sits on a committee assigned the task of formulating a "covenant" for the Anglican Communion, concedes the engagement of the process itself appears to have been inevitable, and that once the complainants against Bishop Duncan formally made their charges to the Review Committee, an examination and determination as to Bp. Duncan's adherence to the Episcopal Church's Constitution and Canons was necessarily demanded, and finally that the use of Title IV.9 - "abandonment of communion" - was reasonably applied in this determination.
Nevertheless, the disciplinary process ought to be suspended--Radner thinks. Why? Radner claims it is an open question as to whether "the Doctrine, Discipline, or Worship of this church" are in fact being upheld and/or embodied by the current executive offices of the Episcopal Church; indeed, he says the question is not currently being and has not been investigated, there is not even an adequate method or procedure in place for determining how to find an answer, what for us should be an authoritative process of finding what should constitute doctrine and discipline for Anglicans is in fact already underway at the Communion-wide level, and TEC's Christian leaders should call a truce rather than "lord it over" Duncan with an exercise of ecclesial power.
II. Why Radner's Argument Does Not Work
I urge anyone considering Radner's course of action to reject it, especially anyone charged with carrying out the disciplinary process. Bishop Duncan ought to be removed from oversight of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, and Radner's case should not convince you otherwise.
Even if it were true that the adherence of TEC's leadership to the worship, doctrine, and discipline of TEC were in fact in question, that would not be relevant to whether the process should go forward against Duncan. I think it is tendentious to suggest that TEC's leadership has abandoned TEC's worship, doctrine, and discipline--and that not even a cogent case has been made for Radner's premise. But, to show how weak and unconvincing Radner's case is, I shall concede his premise and show that even with such a large concession, he still does not have a sound argument.
First, Radner has no sound moral reason for thinking the purported abandonment by TEC's leaders is even relevant to Duncan's case. For instance, if I see Mr. X holding up a 7/11 with a shotgun, and I try to persuade the police not to stop Mr. X, because a few blocks away Mr. Y is holding up a BP with a shotgun, the police would be right to disregard my plea. Mr. Y's holdup does not somehow make Mr. X's holdup OK, or even tolerable. Likewise, Duncan's abandonemnt would not magically be made OK or even tolerable by the leadership's abandonment.
Moreover, Radner's target--the leadership--is the wrong target for the argument he wants to make. As I am sure Radner recognizes, TEC's leadership is not responsible for disciplining Duncan. That responsibility will fall on the HoB, the bishops of the church acting collectively, as a community in council. If Radner could establish that there was a credible claim that the HoB as a whole had abandoned TEC's worship, discipline, and doctrine, then he might be able to charge the HoB as a whole with hypocrisy for disciplining Duncan when their own status was at least unclear. But that is not what Radner claims; Radner attacks the leadership, not the HoB as a whole. At best, since he attacks the leadership, he should argue that they along with Duncan be subjected to the process.
We are led to ask, why on earth would the leadership's failure exonerate Duncan, or even merit the suspension of the process?
More importantly, suppose those responsible for disciplining Duncan were in fact credibly charged with abandonment. That in itself would not suffice for suspending the process. For instance, consider a case where Mr. X is a chain smoking father of Ms. Y, his daughter. He catches her smoking against their rules, and punishes her. When Y objects, saying "You hypocrite! You smoke two packs a day!" her father, X, is justified in keeping the punishment in place. Y's cry of hypocrisy does not make her smoking OK or even tolerable. Her father's wrong does not make her wrongdoing right. Radner seems to have no handle, no grasp, on these basic facts, near the foundations of a proper sense of moral right and wrong.
In short, Radner's case reduces to a tu quoque fallacy. There is nothing a covenant or Williams will--or can--do to change these basic moral premises, to alter the moral fabric of our common life at such a fundamental level. The insruments of unity cannot by their fiat establish that two wrongs make a right. There is no need to wait if they say anything to the contrary before proceeding. Indeed, one might think Gospel freedom did not mean overturning these basic things, but that these things find an ultimate foundation in the nature of God, in the inner life of the Trinity, in our communion with the Godhead.
Indeed, even if the discipliners were in fact credibly charged with abandonment, there would still be reasons to go forward with the process:
(1) Stemming the tide of ecclesial chaos and moving toward stability and closure is grave enough that Duncan must be disciplined by the discipliners even if they do not repent;
(2) The discipliners did not proceed with malice aforethought, whereas Duncan proceeded with a plan and appropriate calulation, so that the wrongs are not equivalent, and the gravity of Duncan's ongoing efforts must be stemmed.
One might have hoped that Radner's own sense of the seriousness of fomenting schism in the church would have been enough to bring home to him the urgency of doing something now to prevent more harm from being done. If TEC's leaders have done something wrong in embracing the doctrines of 2003, it's in the past. It can't now be stopped--we are dealing with the consequences. But we still have time to stop Duncan; there is no reason to passively wait, to pretend we do not have an obligation to stop Duncan before he brings still further ruin.
The instruments of union have unequivocally condemned what Duncan is doing. They have never wavered, and there is no question from them that his course of action, fomenting schism and perpetuating chaos in the church, is morally wrong. No process of discernment or listening is in place for Duncan and his fellow anarchists. But there is a question about what TEC and the ACC's leaders have done. It is not clear whether anyone in the instruments of communion has ever condemned the leadership to whom Radner refers explicitly; as a matter of ecclesial authority, Radner's personal low opinion of them is irrelevant.
Note that the issue at the level of the Communion is not with the leadership at 815, but with the province as a unit, and it seems especially with the bishops who are seen at the Communion level as--in practical terms--governing the province. Radner's demonizing the leadership at 815, as if this counts for something, is a red herring, but more importantly, it personalizes the Communion's conflict with TEC. Who is the face of the leadership at 815? Our Presiding Bishop, a woman. She is easy to make an issue out of; she is already an issue. It seems Radner would attempt to gather support for his covenant plans by unifying around a scapegoat, a group of people--and it seems especially the Presiding Bishop--who can be singled out and blamed and by being blamed be made to bring unity among fissiparous parties.
In a recent piece for ACI, Radner argues that our HoB should prescind from disciplining Bishop Duncan. In it, Radner, who, appointed by Williams himself, sits on a committee assigned the task of formulating a "covenant" for the Anglican Communion, concedes the engagement of the process itself appears to have been inevitable, and that once the complainants against Bishop Duncan formally made their charges to the Review Committee, an examination and determination as to Bp. Duncan's adherence to the Episcopal Church's Constitution and Canons was necessarily demanded, and finally that the use of Title IV.9 - "abandonment of communion" - was reasonably applied in this determination.
Nevertheless, the disciplinary process ought to be suspended--Radner thinks. Why? Radner claims it is an open question as to whether "the Doctrine, Discipline, or Worship of this church" are in fact being upheld and/or embodied by the current executive offices of the Episcopal Church; indeed, he says the question is not currently being and has not been investigated, there is not even an adequate method or procedure in place for determining how to find an answer, what for us should be an authoritative process of finding what should constitute doctrine and discipline for Anglicans is in fact already underway at the Communion-wide level, and TEC's Christian leaders should call a truce rather than "lord it over" Duncan with an exercise of ecclesial power.
II. Why Radner's Argument Does Not Work
I urge anyone considering Radner's course of action to reject it, especially anyone charged with carrying out the disciplinary process. Bishop Duncan ought to be removed from oversight of the Diocese of Pittsburgh, and Radner's case should not convince you otherwise.
Even if it were true that the adherence of TEC's leadership to the worship, doctrine, and discipline of TEC were in fact in question, that would not be relevant to whether the process should go forward against Duncan. I think it is tendentious to suggest that TEC's leadership has abandoned TEC's worship, doctrine, and discipline--and that not even a cogent case has been made for Radner's premise. But, to show how weak and unconvincing Radner's case is, I shall concede his premise and show that even with such a large concession, he still does not have a sound argument.
First, Radner has no sound moral reason for thinking the purported abandonment by TEC's leaders is even relevant to Duncan's case. For instance, if I see Mr. X holding up a 7/11 with a shotgun, and I try to persuade the police not to stop Mr. X, because a few blocks away Mr. Y is holding up a BP with a shotgun, the police would be right to disregard my plea. Mr. Y's holdup does not somehow make Mr. X's holdup OK, or even tolerable. Likewise, Duncan's abandonemnt would not magically be made OK or even tolerable by the leadership's abandonment.
Moreover, Radner's target--the leadership--is the wrong target for the argument he wants to make. As I am sure Radner recognizes, TEC's leadership is not responsible for disciplining Duncan. That responsibility will fall on the HoB, the bishops of the church acting collectively, as a community in council. If Radner could establish that there was a credible claim that the HoB as a whole had abandoned TEC's worship, discipline, and doctrine, then he might be able to charge the HoB as a whole with hypocrisy for disciplining Duncan when their own status was at least unclear. But that is not what Radner claims; Radner attacks the leadership, not the HoB as a whole. At best, since he attacks the leadership, he should argue that they along with Duncan be subjected to the process.
We are led to ask, why on earth would the leadership's failure exonerate Duncan, or even merit the suspension of the process?
More importantly, suppose those responsible for disciplining Duncan were in fact credibly charged with abandonment. That in itself would not suffice for suspending the process. For instance, consider a case where Mr. X is a chain smoking father of Ms. Y, his daughter. He catches her smoking against their rules, and punishes her. When Y objects, saying "You hypocrite! You smoke two packs a day!" her father, X, is justified in keeping the punishment in place. Y's cry of hypocrisy does not make her smoking OK or even tolerable. Her father's wrong does not make her wrongdoing right. Radner seems to have no handle, no grasp, on these basic facts, near the foundations of a proper sense of moral right and wrong.
In short, Radner's case reduces to a tu quoque fallacy. There is nothing a covenant or Williams will--or can--do to change these basic moral premises, to alter the moral fabric of our common life at such a fundamental level. The insruments of unity cannot by their fiat establish that two wrongs make a right. There is no need to wait if they say anything to the contrary before proceeding. Indeed, one might think Gospel freedom did not mean overturning these basic things, but that these things find an ultimate foundation in the nature of God, in the inner life of the Trinity, in our communion with the Godhead.
Indeed, even if the discipliners were in fact credibly charged with abandonment, there would still be reasons to go forward with the process:
(1) Stemming the tide of ecclesial chaos and moving toward stability and closure is grave enough that Duncan must be disciplined by the discipliners even if they do not repent;
(2) The discipliners did not proceed with malice aforethought, whereas Duncan proceeded with a plan and appropriate calulation, so that the wrongs are not equivalent, and the gravity of Duncan's ongoing efforts must be stemmed.
One might have hoped that Radner's own sense of the seriousness of fomenting schism in the church would have been enough to bring home to him the urgency of doing something now to prevent more harm from being done. If TEC's leaders have done something wrong in embracing the doctrines of 2003, it's in the past. It can't now be stopped--we are dealing with the consequences. But we still have time to stop Duncan; there is no reason to passively wait, to pretend we do not have an obligation to stop Duncan before he brings still further ruin.
The instruments of union have unequivocally condemned what Duncan is doing. They have never wavered, and there is no question from them that his course of action, fomenting schism and perpetuating chaos in the church, is morally wrong. No process of discernment or listening is in place for Duncan and his fellow anarchists. But there is a question about what TEC and the ACC's leaders have done. It is not clear whether anyone in the instruments of communion has ever condemned the leadership to whom Radner refers explicitly; as a matter of ecclesial authority, Radner's personal low opinion of them is irrelevant.
Note that the issue at the level of the Communion is not with the leadership at 815, but with the province as a unit, and it seems especially with the bishops who are seen at the Communion level as--in practical terms--governing the province. Radner's demonizing the leadership at 815, as if this counts for something, is a red herring, but more importantly, it personalizes the Communion's conflict with TEC. Who is the face of the leadership at 815? Our Presiding Bishop, a woman. She is easy to make an issue out of; she is already an issue. It seems Radner would attempt to gather support for his covenant plans by unifying around a scapegoat, a group of people--and it seems especially the Presiding Bishop--who can be singled out and blamed and by being blamed be made to bring unity among fissiparous parties.
On the Diocese of San Joaquin
It seems Bishop Schofield and the Southern Cone's Venables made an utter fool out of me for praising hints of an irenic tone in his letter to our Presiding Bishop--his performance at St.Nicholas, Atwater is a parody of episcopal ministry. One would have hoped that the Episcopal Church could have taken more explicit steps to maintain its presence in its diocese; maybe something is in the works, but in a sense significant damage is already done.
I.
I have a hard time seeing any way in which Schofield's action could be justified. From the Separatists' point of view, the action might get any of a variety of readings:
(1) Schofield and Venables are just exercising their episcopal authority in purging fissiparous dissidents.
In that case, however, Separatist complaints about similar purges from Loyalist Episcopal bishops would be sheer hypocrisy. Many Separatists--including Schofield if memory serves me correctly--objected to Smith inhibiting one of the "Con6"--are they now castigating Schofield, as moral consistency would require? Is Schofield casting out Schofield? Moral consistency is not their strong point, perhaps--but why expect that if they have indeed carried out a teleological suspension of the ethical?
(2) You don't like what Schofield and Venables are doing? How does it feel now that the shoe is on the other foot, you apostate liberals?
This is simply a tu quoque: it's fallacious. This sort of argument could not establish that Schofield and Venables are in the right. If the Liberals are wrong to purge, the Wingers are wrong to purge just as well. If the Liberals are right, there is no point to saying "How does it feel?" inasmuch as Wingers on the receiving end would have been wrong to resent being purged.
(3) Ah--but we are permitted to do whatever we wish with the heathen, apostate Liberals. Or at least, because we are holy and they are not, we are permitted to purge them, but they are not permitted to purge us.
But that is an argument a Christian should never make about anybody. It's not just hypocritical, but outright pagan, inasmuch as it implies an outright rejection of the Golden Rule and the Great Commandment, i.e. the essential moral response that marks Christians as such.
Although I do not mean to attribute any of (1)-(3) to Schofield, Venables, or their minions, I do not see what other seeds of justification are available. On the other hand, maybe justification is not the main issue.
II.
What I mean is: obviously Schofield et al. are not acting within the scope of what they can manage to justify. Rather, they are taking advantage of the type of power they have to do what they can manage, even if in the long term it will turn out that they are prevented from going through with it all--whether their use of that power is justified or not.
Their situation does not parallel that of regular bishops like Bishop Smith, as Schofield is now no longer a regular bishop of anything. He is experimenting, trying to improvise--with people as his raw material. He is doing what has not been done before, and nobody has any clear and cogent idea what he is doing or even why it is being done. In particular, the kind of ecclesiology he needs to render his action intelligible, dubious and marginal even if it has Williams' firm support, does not seem to be the kind of ecclesiology he has in mind.
But a Separatist might say "C'mon! What difference does it really make if we step outside of canonical bounds and good order, temporarily?"
I think it makes a great deal of difference. Consider that the congregation of St. Nicholas, through Schofield's action, has become sacred. That is:
a) Schofield et al are being permitted to do whatever they wish without being held accountable,
and
b) there is no ordered and regular deliberation, no canonical procedure governing what happens to them.
They are now in a kind of limbo. They have been made to exist in a space where anything is possible, insofar as they are parishoners, to be sure--but recall that communion is a matter of being, of life, and not tacked on as an additional extra. They have been made the exceptions on the receiving end of an exercise of extralegal sovereign authority, a kind of self-constituting act by Schofield. That is, by acting just as a genuine, regular bishop may, he might constitute his power as genuinely and regularly episcopal. His word, his whim, his innermost petulant passions have the real force of law, and a machinery--a bureaucracy--is set in place, ready to serve as an instrument for the successful projection of those whims and tantrums into reality. And Schofield's proto-sovereign tantrums were on display--garishly, even obscenely--before the congregation of St. Nicholas. And a bureaucrat, a certain so-called "Rev. Canon" Bill Gandenberger, was ready to hand as an instument to render the tantrum efficacious.
If you feel uneasy, even nauseated, at Schofield and Venables, you should. I cannot think of any surer confirmation of the thesis that the Anglican Communion's troubles are biopolitical in nature. Yes, pathetic arguments, all-too-late disavowals and rhetorical hyperbole are mustered as a front by Separatists, but in fact we are living through the gradual dissolution of our church community, a dissolution made flesh in San Joaquin recently, a dissolution St. Nicholas is resisting tooth and nail--and rightly so.
For the new community established by Schofield's means is constituted by establishing the structure of the camp. These nodes--the homo sacer, the exception, sovereign power, the space where anything is possible--cannot but establish an instance of the camp. Not just a kind of state of nature, but rather a kind of normalization of certain aspects of the state of nature, or better: a new communion of provinces is envisaged with relief, pride, and joy where these aspects are considered normal. Where community is established through such means beyond canon and law, beyond ethical rationality and accountability, it cannot help but instantiate the camp as its type.
That this instantiation is actually anticipated in Fort Worth, in Pittsburgh, and elsewhere shows a firm misunderstanding of ourselves as church; under Williams, the Communion as a whole may head in this direction. Given a liberal polity, as in the US, or a left-leaning social environment, as in the UK, such "normalized camp life" might seem innocuous--TEC and the CoE can't exactly bring on the Inquisition.
But the situation is different in Nigeria, in regions where liberal norms and bills of rights have not taken hold. There, the AC's slide into camp life is directly more sinister--and that is reason enough to resist it as the evil it is.
Consider again even the US, Canada & the UK--in these liberalized regions the slide to camp life can be seen in spheres of activity "outside" the church: in medicine, politics, economics, the military, etc.--especially in our post-9/11 era. The fact it is visible in the church too shows a new kind of christendom, a new constantinian settlement, a new variety of fornication is emerging in the church. The fact it seems so innocuous as it operates merely in the church should not leave us blind to its contribution to a much larger enervating trend. Let us have no traffic with this kind of power.
I.
I have a hard time seeing any way in which Schofield's action could be justified. From the Separatists' point of view, the action might get any of a variety of readings:
(1) Schofield and Venables are just exercising their episcopal authority in purging fissiparous dissidents.
In that case, however, Separatist complaints about similar purges from Loyalist Episcopal bishops would be sheer hypocrisy. Many Separatists--including Schofield if memory serves me correctly--objected to Smith inhibiting one of the "Con6"--are they now castigating Schofield, as moral consistency would require? Is Schofield casting out Schofield? Moral consistency is not their strong point, perhaps--but why expect that if they have indeed carried out a teleological suspension of the ethical?
(2) You don't like what Schofield and Venables are doing? How does it feel now that the shoe is on the other foot, you apostate liberals?
This is simply a tu quoque: it's fallacious. This sort of argument could not establish that Schofield and Venables are in the right. If the Liberals are wrong to purge, the Wingers are wrong to purge just as well. If the Liberals are right, there is no point to saying "How does it feel?" inasmuch as Wingers on the receiving end would have been wrong to resent being purged.
(3) Ah--but we are permitted to do whatever we wish with the heathen, apostate Liberals. Or at least, because we are holy and they are not, we are permitted to purge them, but they are not permitted to purge us.
But that is an argument a Christian should never make about anybody. It's not just hypocritical, but outright pagan, inasmuch as it implies an outright rejection of the Golden Rule and the Great Commandment, i.e. the essential moral response that marks Christians as such.
Although I do not mean to attribute any of (1)-(3) to Schofield, Venables, or their minions, I do not see what other seeds of justification are available. On the other hand, maybe justification is not the main issue.
II.
What I mean is: obviously Schofield et al. are not acting within the scope of what they can manage to justify. Rather, they are taking advantage of the type of power they have to do what they can manage, even if in the long term it will turn out that they are prevented from going through with it all--whether their use of that power is justified or not.
Their situation does not parallel that of regular bishops like Bishop Smith, as Schofield is now no longer a regular bishop of anything. He is experimenting, trying to improvise--with people as his raw material. He is doing what has not been done before, and nobody has any clear and cogent idea what he is doing or even why it is being done. In particular, the kind of ecclesiology he needs to render his action intelligible, dubious and marginal even if it has Williams' firm support, does not seem to be the kind of ecclesiology he has in mind.
But a Separatist might say "C'mon! What difference does it really make if we step outside of canonical bounds and good order, temporarily?"
I think it makes a great deal of difference. Consider that the congregation of St. Nicholas, through Schofield's action, has become sacred. That is:
a) Schofield et al are being permitted to do whatever they wish without being held accountable,
and
b) there is no ordered and regular deliberation, no canonical procedure governing what happens to them.
They are now in a kind of limbo. They have been made to exist in a space where anything is possible, insofar as they are parishoners, to be sure--but recall that communion is a matter of being, of life, and not tacked on as an additional extra. They have been made the exceptions on the receiving end of an exercise of extralegal sovereign authority, a kind of self-constituting act by Schofield. That is, by acting just as a genuine, regular bishop may, he might constitute his power as genuinely and regularly episcopal. His word, his whim, his innermost petulant passions have the real force of law, and a machinery--a bureaucracy--is set in place, ready to serve as an instrument for the successful projection of those whims and tantrums into reality. And Schofield's proto-sovereign tantrums were on display--garishly, even obscenely--before the congregation of St. Nicholas. And a bureaucrat, a certain so-called "Rev. Canon" Bill Gandenberger, was ready to hand as an instument to render the tantrum efficacious.
If you feel uneasy, even nauseated, at Schofield and Venables, you should. I cannot think of any surer confirmation of the thesis that the Anglican Communion's troubles are biopolitical in nature. Yes, pathetic arguments, all-too-late disavowals and rhetorical hyperbole are mustered as a front by Separatists, but in fact we are living through the gradual dissolution of our church community, a dissolution made flesh in San Joaquin recently, a dissolution St. Nicholas is resisting tooth and nail--and rightly so.
For the new community established by Schofield's means is constituted by establishing the structure of the camp. These nodes--the homo sacer, the exception, sovereign power, the space where anything is possible--cannot but establish an instance of the camp. Not just a kind of state of nature, but rather a kind of normalization of certain aspects of the state of nature, or better: a new communion of provinces is envisaged with relief, pride, and joy where these aspects are considered normal. Where community is established through such means beyond canon and law, beyond ethical rationality and accountability, it cannot help but instantiate the camp as its type.
That this instantiation is actually anticipated in Fort Worth, in Pittsburgh, and elsewhere shows a firm misunderstanding of ourselves as church; under Williams, the Communion as a whole may head in this direction. Given a liberal polity, as in the US, or a left-leaning social environment, as in the UK, such "normalized camp life" might seem innocuous--TEC and the CoE can't exactly bring on the Inquisition.
But the situation is different in Nigeria, in regions where liberal norms and bills of rights have not taken hold. There, the AC's slide into camp life is directly more sinister--and that is reason enough to resist it as the evil it is.
Consider again even the US, Canada & the UK--in these liberalized regions the slide to camp life can be seen in spheres of activity "outside" the church: in medicine, politics, economics, the military, etc.--especially in our post-9/11 era. The fact it is visible in the church too shows a new kind of christendom, a new constantinian settlement, a new variety of fornication is emerging in the church. The fact it seems so innocuous as it operates merely in the church should not leave us blind to its contribution to a much larger enervating trend. Let us have no traffic with this kind of power.
Williams' Advent Letter
The bottom line on Williams' Advent Letter? It's good enough to work with, and better than might have been hoped. Its worst parts have more to do with--it seems to me--Williams' personal idiosyncracies.
On the positive side, as TEC already holds to the Quadrilateral and to the supremacy of Scripture, much of Williams' section 2 should be read as a friendly attempt to shift our debates and disagreements to ground where the topic is not so much homosexuality as hermeneutics. Doesn't his attempt to move the debate along deserve our firm support? And doesn't it bode bode well for TEC in the long term?
Williams continues to hold that the word of Lambeth '98 1.10 expresses the mind of the Communion--surely a tendentious stand. He may seem obtuse in his tenacity--but wait. Lambeth resolutions can flip around with the wind; they are established on the basis of mere aggregates of transient opinion. And Lambeth '98 demonstrated how supermajorities can be assembled on the spot via combinations of manipulative rhetoric and lobbying. Thus, the incendiary parts of Lambeth '98 can be contradicted with some effort in good time.
There is precious little of substance to Williams' stand other than obstinate adherence to the latest ecclesial fashion--decided merely by majority rule--and his stand appears steadfast only because the occasions for contradiction pass at ten year intervals. We tend not to be that patient--left or right. Williams' tenacious hold to Lambeth could eventually cut TEC's way, and his emphasis on Scriptural authority can be taken as a positive development.
It is more difficult to credit his mention of Bishop Robinson again by name:
Thus it is not surprising if some have concluded that the official organs of The Episcopal Church, in confirming the election of Gene Robinson and in giving what many regard as implicit sanction to same-sex blessings of a public nature have put in question the degree to which it can be recognised as belonging to the same family by deciding to act against the strong, reiterated and consistent advice of the Instruments of Communion.
Robinson is not addressed as bishop, but as an individual with a scandalous sexuality. He is being treated here as the exception, subjected to the unique authority of the Archbishop as a means to securing the Communion's unity: a sacred man or, in another conceptual framework, a scapegoat. Williams should know better, judging from his writing on Girard. I have no idea if he is familiar with Taubes, Schmitt, and Agamben as well; even so that would not help his case. He has done this sort of thing to Robinson before and shows no sign of letting up--a merely personal tick?
Moreover, he picks a gratuitous fight with TEC by questioning the legitimacy of its episcopate:
It raises a major ecclesiological issue, not about some sort of autocratic episcopal privilege but about the understanding in The Episcopal Church of the distinctive charism of bishops as an order and their responsibility for sustaining doctrinal standards. Once again, there seems to be a gap between what some in The Episcopal Church understand about the ministry of bishops and what is held elsewhere in the Communion, and this needs to be addressed.
"Once again"--ordaining Robinson seems to be the other case. This is what theological
postliberalism can look like--Williams' ignorance of the very type of power politics in which he
himself is engaged. A grotesque ignorance of TEC's history: our relatively unique episcopate is no accident, and his special pleading with the circumscription "not about some sort of autocratic episcopal privilege" seems willfully perverse. As if episcopal autocracy were the only available
disjunct driving the formation of our polity! The Enlightenment, and the notion of a republic ordered with intrinsic checks, did not arise in a vacuum but out of the failure of premodernity to--among other things--regulate its indulgence in the rituals of power politics. TEC's polity arose in the recognition--the self-recognition--of a potentiality for disordered desire at the level of social structures. It is ironic Williams' very questioning of this polity shows the need for it.
Going over the Archbishop's latest missives, I found myself reading not with the expectation of cogency, but with respect for--even fear of--his power. Who reads or listens to the Archbishop with the expectation of finding a convincing line of reasoning or a persuasive articulation of some as-yet largley unseen picture?
What is important is rather that he wields an enormous amount of power with regard to both left and right, and whichever way the wind happens to tumble him about, he will end up having enormous influence. Whole provinces stand or fall, form or are finished off on the basis of what he says and does not say--and it seems his style of communicating has only intensified the spectacle of Communion-wide focus on his every nod and arched eyebrow.
What does the habit of such a focus do to a community? It is not as if there are principles to be found underneath the words that guide what he asserts with some formal argumentative force. The power of this office is wielded without a set of discernible reasons, but with great reliance on the relevance of the person of Williams and his contingencies, as well as a rhetoric of persuasion based on fear.
Still, this letter is good enough to work with. We would probably do well not addressing Williams' personal idiosyncracies head-on; they are not that important, and we need less wrangling. We already know, for instance, he does not view--even in this letter-- TEC or any province as a real church, he treats Robinson as a scapegoat, and he questions the legitimacy of our episcopate. While it would be tempting to take these views on, we would probably do better ignoring these oddities.
On the positive side, as TEC already holds to the Quadrilateral and to the supremacy of Scripture, much of Williams' section 2 should be read as a friendly attempt to shift our debates and disagreements to ground where the topic is not so much homosexuality as hermeneutics. Doesn't his attempt to move the debate along deserve our firm support? And doesn't it bode bode well for TEC in the long term?
Williams continues to hold that the word of Lambeth '98 1.10 expresses the mind of the Communion--surely a tendentious stand. He may seem obtuse in his tenacity--but wait. Lambeth resolutions can flip around with the wind; they are established on the basis of mere aggregates of transient opinion. And Lambeth '98 demonstrated how supermajorities can be assembled on the spot via combinations of manipulative rhetoric and lobbying. Thus, the incendiary parts of Lambeth '98 can be contradicted with some effort in good time.
There is precious little of substance to Williams' stand other than obstinate adherence to the latest ecclesial fashion--decided merely by majority rule--and his stand appears steadfast only because the occasions for contradiction pass at ten year intervals. We tend not to be that patient--left or right. Williams' tenacious hold to Lambeth could eventually cut TEC's way, and his emphasis on Scriptural authority can be taken as a positive development.
It is more difficult to credit his mention of Bishop Robinson again by name:
Thus it is not surprising if some have concluded that the official organs of The Episcopal Church, in confirming the election of Gene Robinson and in giving what many regard as implicit sanction to same-sex blessings of a public nature have put in question the degree to which it can be recognised as belonging to the same family by deciding to act against the strong, reiterated and consistent advice of the Instruments of Communion.
Robinson is not addressed as bishop, but as an individual with a scandalous sexuality. He is being treated here as the exception, subjected to the unique authority of the Archbishop as a means to securing the Communion's unity: a sacred man or, in another conceptual framework, a scapegoat. Williams should know better, judging from his writing on Girard. I have no idea if he is familiar with Taubes, Schmitt, and Agamben as well; even so that would not help his case. He has done this sort of thing to Robinson before and shows no sign of letting up--a merely personal tick?
Moreover, he picks a gratuitous fight with TEC by questioning the legitimacy of its episcopate:
It raises a major ecclesiological issue, not about some sort of autocratic episcopal privilege but about the understanding in The Episcopal Church of the distinctive charism of bishops as an order and their responsibility for sustaining doctrinal standards. Once again, there seems to be a gap between what some in The Episcopal Church understand about the ministry of bishops and what is held elsewhere in the Communion, and this needs to be addressed.
"Once again"--ordaining Robinson seems to be the other case. This is what theological
postliberalism can look like--Williams' ignorance of the very type of power politics in which he
himself is engaged. A grotesque ignorance of TEC's history: our relatively unique episcopate is no accident, and his special pleading with the circumscription "not about some sort of autocratic episcopal privilege" seems willfully perverse. As if episcopal autocracy were the only available
disjunct driving the formation of our polity! The Enlightenment, and the notion of a republic ordered with intrinsic checks, did not arise in a vacuum but out of the failure of premodernity to--among other things--regulate its indulgence in the rituals of power politics. TEC's polity arose in the recognition--the self-recognition--of a potentiality for disordered desire at the level of social structures. It is ironic Williams' very questioning of this polity shows the need for it.
Going over the Archbishop's latest missives, I found myself reading not with the expectation of cogency, but with respect for--even fear of--his power. Who reads or listens to the Archbishop with the expectation of finding a convincing line of reasoning or a persuasive articulation of some as-yet largley unseen picture?
What is important is rather that he wields an enormous amount of power with regard to both left and right, and whichever way the wind happens to tumble him about, he will end up having enormous influence. Whole provinces stand or fall, form or are finished off on the basis of what he says and does not say--and it seems his style of communicating has only intensified the spectacle of Communion-wide focus on his every nod and arched eyebrow.
What does the habit of such a focus do to a community? It is not as if there are principles to be found underneath the words that guide what he asserts with some formal argumentative force. The power of this office is wielded without a set of discernible reasons, but with great reliance on the relevance of the person of Williams and his contingencies, as well as a rhetoric of persuasion based on fear.
Still, this letter is good enough to work with. We would probably do well not addressing Williams' personal idiosyncracies head-on; they are not that important, and we need less wrangling. We already know, for instance, he does not view--even in this letter-- TEC or any province as a real church, he treats Robinson as a scapegoat, and he questions the legitimacy of our episcopate. While it would be tempting to take these views on, we would probably do better ignoring these oddities.
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