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Disciples of Jesus Christ are acutely conscious of their inability to replicate themselves. It is not a natural process. A miracle is necessary every time another person embraces Christ in repentant faith and sets out on the path of following Christ. Nevertheless, disciples can be supremely confident that sowing seed will result in a harvest because God is calling out a people for His name, and the Great Commission is His chosen method of producing disciples.

The history of the Baptist denomination contains many examples of successful disciple-making disciples. Because the story of the Baptist denomination is usually told from the vantage point of English-speaking Baptists, one of the greatest of these Baptists may be overlooked. Every Baptist should know the story of the Father of European Baptists, Johann Gerhard Oncken. He dedicated his life to making disciples, and the effects of his ministry are still being felt around the world today.

Birth to New Birth

Oncken was born into a Lutheran home in Varel, in the Duchy of Oldenburg on the North Sea, on January 26,聽1800.2聽His father was away from home when he was born, working with conspirators who were seeking to overthrow Napoleon. When the plot was discovered, the older Oncken fled to England. He died there, never seeing his son or knowing he had one.

Oncken was reared by his grandmother, a severe woman who made sure he was a good Lutheran. The Lutheran church in that part of Germany was quite dead, and Oncken experienced no spiritual influences in early life. Oncken later stated 鈥渢hat neither from any of his teachers or from the Lutheran pastor, did he receive a single true direction of salvation by Jesus Christ.鈥�3

In 1814 a Scottish businessman came to Varel, liked Oncken, and invited him to return to Scotland with him. Oncken jumped at the chance. The businessman鈥檚 wife was Presbyterian, and the family gave Oncken his first Bible. He traveled extensively while in the man鈥檚 employ, visiting England, France, and Germany.

While in England for an extended period of business, Oncken stayed with a godly family that attended a Congregational church. The father openly prayed for Oncken鈥檚 salvation during daily family devotions. After months of exposure to the gospel, Oncken visited Great Queen Street Methodist chapel in London, heard the gospel, and was saved. The key verse in his salvation was Romans 8:1: 鈥淭here is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus.鈥�

He immediately became passionate about sharing his faith with friends and coworkers, sacrificing a portion of his lunch money to purchase tracts. He got a cold response from聽most of them, but within a short time after his salvation, he had the joy of seeing one of his neighbors in the apartment building profess faith in Christ. He knew he wanted to spend his life sharing the gospel.

Missionary

Oncken鈥檚 passion to share the gospel鈥攄istributing tracts, writing letters to his mother and other relatives, and sharing the gospel regularly鈥攃ame to the attention of the Congregationalist organizers of the Continental Society, an organization founded in 1819 to send missionaries to Continental Europe. In 1823 the Society appointed Oncken as a missionary to Germany and sent him to Hamburg.

Oncken joined an English Reformed Church in Hamburg (transferring his membership from the Independent church he had joined in London) and began attempting to evangelize his neighbors. His pastor, T. W. Matthews, invited him to live in his home and supported his work among the Germans. Matthews also provided a large room in which Oncken could hold preaching services, which he began to do in 1824. Cooke reports the remarkable growth that ensued:

At his first meeting on January 7th 1827 [sic, the date should be 1824] ten persons came out of curiosity to hear the new English religion, as his message was contemptuously called, and one soul was converted to God. The name of that first convert was C. F. Lange, who afterwards became a valuable helper in his work. At the next meeting 18, at the following 30, and on February 8th 180 attended; on February 24th the crowd was so great that聽about 100 were turned away for want of room; many came smiling and left weeping.4

Soon the established Union Church (the Lutherans and Reformed had merged in Germany and were the state-sponsored church) began harassing him. Fined, Oncken refused to pay and had his possessions seized. The meeting room provided by Matthews had to be discontinued, but Oncken held private meetings in cellars, alleyways, private homes, and wherever he could get a hearing. The persecution and his incessant activities caused people to flock to hear him, and the mission prospered.

Hamburg was a very religious city, but Oncken discovered widespread biblical illiteracy. Only one Lutheran pastor in the entire city believed in the deity of Christ. Oncken believed that revival would follow if he could get the Scriptures into the hands of his German countrymen. In 1828 he opened a bookstore, primarily for the distribution of Bibles. Through his contacts in Scotland, he connected with the Edinburgh Bible Society, becoming its agent in 1828. For the next fifty years (until 1878), he and his coworkers distributed Bibles provided by that society. According to its records, he distributed two million Bibles. A byproduct of starting this business was that Oncken was able to gain citizenship in Hamburg on April 25, 1828.

While this sketch will not focus on Oncken鈥檚 family life, it is worth noting that he was a family man and experienced the blessings and trials of domestic life. In 1828 he married Sarah Mann of London. She became fluent in German and was a great asset to his ministry. Between 1829 and 1844, Sarah bore him four daughters and three sons. They had their share of heartache, with a daughter dying of cholera at a few months of age, a daughter dying of an illness at age 5, and their youngest son dying in a fire at the age of 8 while聽Oncken was away preaching. Oncken was left with five children, one of whom was 15 months old when Sarah passed away in 1845. Two years later, he married another British lady named Ann Dogshun, and they served together until her death in 1873. She was loved both by Oncken鈥檚 children and the Hamburg congregation. Finally, in 1875 Oncken married Jane Clark, a member of Spurgeon鈥檚 Tabernacle; she outlived him, caring for him during his final days in Zurich.

Becoming a Baptist

In 1826 two evangelical Lutheran ministers had offered to pay for Oncken鈥檚 ministerial education if he would commit to the Lutheran ministry. He declined on the basis that he already had misgivings about infant baptism. When his first daughter was born in 1829, he declined to present her for sprinkling.

Pastor Matthews urged Oncken to present his child for baptism and preached a sermon on infant baptism to convince him. The weakness of Matthews鈥� argument cemented Oncken鈥檚 resolution to pursue believer鈥檚 baptism. Matthews evidently made a poor case for infant baptism, as two Methodists who were present in the assembly subsequently became Baptists, and Matthews himself鈥攏ow studying the question in earnest鈥攚ent to England a few months later and received baptism from Baptists there. He later became pastor of a Baptist church in Boston. Oncken, meanwhile, continued to study the Scriptures.

In 1829 an American sea captain named Tubbs while visiting Hamburg had his ship detained for six months because of ice. He was a member of Sansom Street Baptist Church in Philadelphia. Having met Oncken and the little聽group of disciples gathered around him, he began holding Bible studies with them and explaining Baptist doctrine to them. Testing everything by the Scriptures, Oncken became convinced of believer鈥檚 baptism.

There was no one in Germany, however, to baptize him. He wrote to Robert Haldane in Scotland for advice; Haldane suggested he baptize himself, citing the example of John Smyth. Oncken saw no biblical precedent for this and rejected the advice. He then wrote to Joseph Ivimey, a notable Baptist pastor in London. Ivimey invited him to come to London to be baptized. That was not practical (and would be no testimony to the German believers), so Oncken continued to pray about the matter and await the Lord鈥檚 will. He talked with British and American visitors to Hamburg. Nevertheless, he was unsure how to proceed.

Captain Tubbs returned to America and told his pastor and other leaders of the Triennial Convention about Oncken and his situation. Founded in 1814, the Triennial Convention was the national missionary-sending agency of the American Baptists. One of those leaders was Barnas Sears, a professor at Hamilton Literary Theological Institute in New York. In 1833 Sears went to Europe for academic studies primarily at Halle. While in Germany, Sears went to Hamburg to find Oncken.5 Oncken had been praying and waiting for over four years.

Because of Oncken鈥檚 busy preaching schedule, there was some delay in Sears being able to connect with the German, but finally they were able to do so. Sears was delighted to find a small group of believers who had become thoroughly convinced of believer鈥檚 baptism. They desired baptism, but Hamburg had a law against immersion. The American professor and the small band of Germans were not deterred,聽but they were cautious. On April 22, 1834, Sears, Oncken, Oncken鈥檚 wife, and five others rowed to an island in the middle of the Elbe River and were baptized at midnight. Oncken later wrote,

All was dark; we had neither the prospect nor the hope of success. We were compelled blindly to follow our Master. Not one of us entertained the slightest hope that the Almighty would, by this feeble commencement, convey his thoughts of peace to thousands, and spread afar his ancient apostolic truth. Conviction impelled us onwards; we could not but act as we did, come what might. But, although externally all was dark, within us all was light. In those memorable days which followed, my heart was so joyous, it seemed to me, as I walked through the streets of Hamburg, as if everybody must know I had put on Christ by baptism.6

The next day, Sears ordained Oncken, although the German had no formal education. The American professor then presided over the establishment of the first Baptist church in Germany and 鈥渢he oldest surviving Baptist church in Europe.鈥�7 Shortly thereafter, Sears petitioned the American Triennial Convention to give financial support to Oncken鈥檚 work in Hamburg. 鈥淚f we consider the pagan state of that great city,鈥� reasoned Sears, 鈥渨e must look upon this missionary labor of private brethren as truly apostolical.鈥� Sears conceded that 鈥済reat results had not yet been witnessed, but everything wears an encouraging aspect.鈥� The聽professor especially commended the atmosphere of Christian love that characterized the embryonic church at Hamburg.8

Hamburg

The new church met in Oncken鈥檚 home at No. 7 Englische Planke in Hamburg, using the bottom floor as a Bible bookstore. The bookstore grew rapidly and was soon moved to larger facilities near the center of the city.

The Continental Society severed connections with Oncken upon receiving word of his baptism. Through the instrumentality of Sears, Oncken was accepted as a missionary of the Triennial Convention in America (later, the American Baptist Missionary Union [ABMU]). In addition to seeking to win people to Christ, his primary heartbeat, Oncken also believed strongly that Baptist teachings best reflected the New Testament. If he met a fellow believer, he usually sought to convince the person of Baptist convictions. And he could be very persuasive.

Julius K枚bner, having been saved in 1826, met Oncken shortly after Oncken was baptized. Oncken convinced him of Baptist theology and baptized him in 1836. A Danish Jew, K枚bner had a burden for Denmark. He accompanied Oncken on numerous missionary forays into Denmark and saw a Baptist witness established in Scandinavia.

Gottfried Wilhelm Lehmann grew up in Berlin and was influenced by Mennonites. His interest in tract distribution brought him into contact with Oncken, and they were friends before either was a Baptist. Oncken convinced him of Baptist views and baptized him, his wife, and four others outside Berlin in 1836. Lehmann became pastor of this small assembly. In 1840 Oncken suggested he seek ordination from the British Baptists. Lehmann received this ordination in London on June 29, 1840. His church in Berlin grew to聽100 members in 1841 and was forced to move out of his house into new facilities. By 1842 the Berlin congregation surpassed 300 members.

Oncken, K枚bner, and Lehmann made an amazing triumvirate. The German Christians nicknamed them the Kleeblatt, or 鈥渃loverleaf.鈥� From the hubs in Hamburg and Berlin, these men and their associates fanned out, distributing vast amounts of literature, seeing professions of faith, and gathering them into Baptist churches. To organize the literature distribution, Oncken founded the Hamburg Tract Society in 1836, which eventually worked in conjunction with 鈥渢he Religious Tract Society of London, the American Bible and Tract Society, the Scottish National Bible Society, and other Christian literary institutions.鈥�9

Oncken鈥檚 work in Hamburg and across Germany faced severe persecution from the local political units and from the established state-church. Conventicle laws in many German states required an authorized representative of the Established Church in any assembly of five or more persons not consisting of family members. Oncken applied for permission to hold devotio domestica (family devotions) for his house-church in Hamburg, but his request was denied for obvious reasons. The chief Lutheran pastor in Hamburg, A. J. Rambach, was a severe opponent of the Baptists, whom he called 鈥渁 fanatical Anabaptist sect.鈥�10 He urged the Hamburg government to apply conventicle laws directly against the Baptists.

Hamburg authorities arrested Oncken and placed him in the notorious Winserbaum prison in both 1839 and 1840. Sarah pled with the authorities to release Oncken when Lydia, his daughter, fell seriously ill. Oncken was offered release if he would promise not to preach. He declined. Finally, in 1840 he was released as Lydia grew close to death. Rather than staying home, he went to Copenhagen and presided over the baptism of seven people. Lydia died while he was away. The oft-heard charges that these early German Baptists were fanatical had some truth to it.

Oncken鈥檚 co-pastor, K枚bner, and his deacon, Lange, were also arrested. Once, Oncken heard singing from a cell above his, and, recognizing the voice as that of his co-pastor, he chimed in and the two of them sang in the jail like Paul and Silas.

The tide finally turned in 1842, when a great fire devastated Hamburg. Over three days, 2000 homes were destroyed, 30,000 people were rendered homeless, 100 were injured, and about 50 died.11 Oncken and his assistants, especially Lange, stepped up and heroically served the suffering people. The Baptists had just secured a four-story warehouse for their use. Oncken immediately invited the authorities to use three of the stories as emergency housing for people dispossessed by the fire. They showed love and compassion to the very people who had harassed and persecuted them for the previous decade. Both the populace and the government rapidly changed their opinion of the Baptists.

Nevertheless, in 1843 Oncken went to prison yet again for administering the sacraments without proper ordination. Hamburg was beginning to shift its policies away from persecution, however, and he was released after just four聽days.12 Later that year vandals harmed the Baptists鈥� property, and Oncken鈥檚 old enemy Police Chief Binder aggressively defended the Baptists. Oncken wrote,

O, what a change! The senator at the head of the police has shown me in this affair the utmost kindness. For nearly 23 years I had this person for my bitterest foe, who hunted me during that period like a partridge on the mountains, but now he is my friend and my protector.13

In the face of such opposition, the Hamburg church grew to 380 by 1845, and in 1847 the first building was erected. In 1867 the church had grown to the point that a new spacious church was constructed, with seating for over 1400. Charles Haddon Spurgeon preached at the opening of that building and tells this remarkable story:

I remember in the life of my dear friend, Mr. Oncken, of Hamburg, when he began to baptize people in the Alster contrary to the law. He was brought up before the burgomaster, and that worthy magistrate put him several times in prison. At last Mr. Burgomaster said, 鈥淚 tell you what it is, Mr. Oncken; the law must be obeyed. Do you see that little finger of mine? As long as that little finger will move, I will put you down in your illegal baptisms.鈥� 鈥淲ell,鈥� said my brave old friend, 鈥淢r. Burgomaster, with all respect to you, I do see that little finger of yours; but do you see that great hand of God? I am afraid that you do not see it as I do. But, as long as that great hand of God is with me, you cannot put me down.鈥� I opened Mr. Oncken鈥檚 chapel in Hamburg some years afterwards, and I had a most聽respectable audience gathered together to hear me preach the gospel, and in the center of that audience sat the Burgomaster. He was far more rejoiced to be there than to be carrying out an oppressive law. His little finger had ceased its movements against the Baptist, and there he sat to show what the power of God鈥檚 right arm could do; for he was listening to the Word of God from a Baptist preacher, in a meeting-house built by the man whom he had been called upon to put down.14

In 1848 in the context of revolutions sweeping Europe, the citizens of Hamburg gathered and voted to grant every citizen full religious freedom. Oncken was among the voters, and Baptists benefited greatly from this extension of religious freedom to all. By that time, there were 1,500 Baptists in Germany and 26 congregations.15 Hamburg extended full toleration to the Baptists in 1857, and in 1866 complete toleration of all religious bodies was finally declared.

By 1850 Oncken鈥檚 church was supporting three mission-aries and had raised funds to sponsor the planting of 20 churches in Germany. The key to this rapid expansion was a discipleship mindset. In 1849 thirty German Baptist churches (with 56 representatives), all of which traced their birth to Oncken and his associates鈥� work, formed together the Union of Associated Churches of Baptized Christians in Germany and Denmark. Their charter emphasized discipleship.16

• The charter urged each church to have a missions committee, to take up regular offerings for missions work, and to participate in periodic missions conferences.
• The committees generally met monthly to discuss missions strategies.
• The Union divided into four regional associations, and each developed its own mission-support mechanisms.
• The charter recommended the establishment of youth groups in each church. The youth were taught how to evangelize and were mobilized to share the gospel.
• Laymen were encouraged to evangelize as they carried out their daily tasks, and funds were set up to supplement the income of laymen who suffered financially because they devoted time to evangelism.

In short, Oncken鈥檚 motto, 鈥淓very Baptist a Missionary,鈥� permeated the Union.

European Ministry

Oncken himself was the most successful missionary sent out of Hamburg. In addition to leading his church, Oncken began traveling across Europe, preaching the gospel and Baptist convictions. He preached in Denmark, England, Lithuania, Switzerland, and many other places.

His biographer randomly selected one of Oncken鈥檚 missionary letters to the ABMU from 1846. The following is a summary of Oncken鈥檚 itinerary:

• Oncken traveled to Breslau in Silesia, won two Roman Catholics to Christ, who quickly brought four others to salvation. Oncken then baptized these six people and organized them into a Baptist church. He ordained a pastor to minister to them and spent several weeks giving them instruction.
• He moved on to Stettin in Prussia, where he discovered that 120 persons had been baptized in the last few months. He ministered among them, gave them money and ordered Bibles for them from the Depot. He also learned of revival in five or six surrounding villages, in which 49 people had been baptized earlier that year.
• He visited a Moravian settlement at Niesky and was welcomed graciously by the minister, who brought up baptism. They enjoyed spirited conversation, with the minister admitting that infant baptism had no support in Scripture.
• From there he traveled to Thorn, where he had religious conversation with a small group of members of the State Church. Although not winning them to Baptist views, he believed 鈥渉is testimony had not been in vain.鈥� His biographer concludes, 鈥淚f very definite in faith, Mr. Oncken was broad in charity.鈥�
• 鈥淗e then went on to Schneidenmuhl, where he was disheartened by a cold formal reception, for nothing seemed to repel him like religious frost.鈥�17
• Coming to Schwetz, he met a procession of Poles, singing songs to the Virgin Mary. He gave them tracts.
• On the Lord鈥檚 Day, he preached at a Mennonite Church. Then in the evening, he preached again in a barn to about 100 people.
• Over the next few weeks, he visited and preached at Graudenz, Garnsee, Saalfeldt, Allenstein, Warteburg,聽鈥渁nd other adjacent places, and making some evangelical efforts at each.鈥�18
• Arriving in Konigsberg, he was arrested and ordered to return to Hamburg. He left but went on to Elbing, where he was again arrested and ordered to return home. Before leaving, he gathered the believers there and preached and exhorted until late at night.
• He left the next morning at 4:00 and took a 48-hour train ride to Berlin, during which he witnessed to several people on the train. Arriving in Berlin, he spent four or five days with the Baptist believers in that city.
• He then returned to Stettin, helped to organize a church there, evaded the police who were searching for him, and finally arrived safely back in Hamburg.
• The biographer indicates that this was a typical missionary tour.

The following month he traveled to England to raise money to build a new chapel in Hamburg and was able to collect 450 pounds. He reported that 73 people had been added to the Hamburg church that year by baptism, raising the membership to 326.

As in Hamburg, Oncken and his associates faced almost continuous persecution for the first few decades of their work in Germany. At this time, Germany consisted of thirty-six independent states, and many of them were as repressive as Hamburg had been. The disunity of Germany did mean, however, that Oncken and his associates could evade persecution by fleeing from one state into another.

During his many missionary journeys, his safety and even his life were often endangered by the fury of fanatical mobs, and until 1848 he was also subjected to expulsions, fines, and imprisonment by the police. In the duchy of Hesse-Gassel, even a reward was offered for his apprehen-sion. In Denmark, he was declared an outlaw, and a judicial decree was issued threatening with the severest penalties any person concealing his whereabouts while in the country, and offering a reward of twenty dollars to any person causing his arrest or giving precise information as to where he could be found. Mr. Oncken later wrote about this: 鈥淥ur baptisms all took place under cover of the night and on my missionary tours, which were frequently extensive, I was banished successively from almost every State in Germany. I could never travel as an honest man by daylight, but was compelled to journey on foot in the darkness, to hold services, examine candidates, administer the ordinances, and form churches in the dead of night, and take care to be across the frontiers before break of day for fear of my pursuers.鈥�19

Given the spectacular results Oncken enjoyed, one might be inclined to question his theology of evangelism. On the contrary, Oncken was a careful theologian. Consider the following excerpts from a letter written to the son of a British friend who had not yet come to Christ:

The reason why faith is represented in the Holy Scriptures as of such paramount importance, does not arise from any inherent efficacy in faith itself, but because true faith forgets and rejects everything on earth and in heaven, and looks to and grasps the Lord Jesus Christ and His work. . . . We do not wish you to go to heaven, my dear boy, without good works, for you never will enter those holy gates without them, but we wish you to bring such works as are perfect: The works of the Lord Jesus Christ who had聽no sin, neither was any guile found in his mouth. . . . Faith, then, dear Martin, upholds and defends the most perfect works that can be conceived: for it rests upon the glorious work of our dear Redeemer. If such be the case, it follows as a matter of course that in our own lives we shall tread as closely in the footsteps of our Lord, as present imperfection allows, but never, never can our imperfect obedience gain us an admission to heaven.鈥�20

Oncken was, in fact, decidedly Calvinistic, but he was warm-hearted toward any who preached the gospel. In a letter to Sarah while she was in Edinburgh before they were married, Oncken wrote,

I am sorry to say that though God has some witnesses of the faith in Hamburg, there is not one serious German I have met, with whom I can agree in doctrines, they are all Arminians without exception, and a holy Arminian I can love as well as a Calvanist [sic], but there are no English Methodists among the Germans.21

Under Oncken鈥檚 direction, the German Baptists sent missionaries to Denmark, Finland, Poland, Holland, Switzerland, Russia, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Africa. Many European countries owe their Baptist origins to Oncken and his colleagues. Each of these countries has its own story, some of which are vast and fascinating in themselves. Here we can only sketch some of them.

• Denmark, 1838. Oncken and K枚bner established the first Baptist church in K枚bner鈥檚 home country. The Danish authorities launched vigorous persecution of the Baptists, urged to it by the established Lutheran Church. Nevertheless, by 1892 the largest body of dissenters in the country was Baptist.22
• Netherlands, 1845. A Dutch Reformed minister, J. E. Feisser, was defrocked for questioning infant baptism in the early 1840s. Oncken sent K枚bner to meet him, and K枚bner won him to Baptist views. In May 1845 K枚bner baptized Feisser and six others and formed them into a Baptist church in Gasselte-Nijveen.
• Hungary, 1846. Hungarian carpenters who were working in Hamburg after the great fire came into contact with Oncken and the Baptists and were converted. They returned to Hungary and established a Baptist church in Budapest. Within a few years, it was scattered by persecution. Nearly thirty years later, Oncken sent Heinrich Meyer to Hungary, and he succeeded in establishing another Baptist church in Budapest, baptizing eight converts on August 26, 1874. One of the persons baptized by Meyer was Kornya Mihaly. He began studying the Scriptures, and in 1877 Oncken ordained him to gospel ministry. He began a dynamic preaching ministry in which is it said that he baptized 11,000 Hungarians before his death in 1917.
• Switzerland, 1847. Oncken made a preaching tour of Switzerland, locating several house churches that already practiced believer鈥檚 baptism. He helped several organize as Baptist churches, and he distributed literature. His assistant, Friederich Maier,聽planted a Baptist church in Zurich in 1849, which became the hub for Baptist missionary activity in the country. The Swiss churches joined the Baptist Union in Germany in 1870.
• Austria, 1847. Some Austrian workers who had helped in Hamburg after the great fire adopted Baptist views through Oncken鈥檚 influence. They invited Oncken to preach in Vienna in 1847, where he saw a number of professions of faith. Returning twice more in 1848, Oncken encouraged the Austrian believers to organize, but government oppression there was fierce. A British missionary came to Austria to aid the work and saw a number of conversions and baptisms, but his entire house church was arrested and imprisoned by Austrian authorities in 1850. It was nearly twenty years later before the first Austrian Baptist church could be organized, and freedom of religion did not come to Austria until early the next century. Oncken鈥檚 son, W. S. Oncken, ministered in Austria for some time.23
• Sweden, 1849. F. O. Nilsson, baptized by Oncken in 1847, began preaching in Sweden in 1849. Banished from Sweden in 1852, he organized a Swedish Baptist church in America. Before he left, he baptized Andreas Wiberg, who had been convinced by Oncken of Baptist views the previous year. Wiberg鈥檚 extensive efforts brought success and persecution from the established Lutheran Church.24
• Russia, 1864. In 1864 Oncken preached in St. Petersburg and led a number of Russian Mennonites to the Lord, and they established the first Russian Baptist church three years later. Shortly after he first arrived, Oncken met with the President of the Ministry for the Interior, Count Sievers. The Count informed Oncken that people in Russia were free to hold whatever faith they chose, but proselytizing was strictly forbidden, and Oncken鈥檚 was evidently a proselytizing faith. To this, Oncken replied,

Your Excellence, everything depends on what you understand by proselytizing; if the charge brought against us means that our primary object is to put people under water, we repudiate the charge. We Baptists give to baptism a different place in theology from almost all other sects. We do not hold that it is necessary to get to heaven; we believe it has no connection with it, and if a person came to me wishing to be baptized in order to get to heaven, I would not comply with such a request. We hold that simple faith in our Lord Jesus Christ and His finished work saves the soul; and we believe that God has called us to preach this great truth among the millions throughout Europe, who have rejected all revealed truth and who form a most dangerous element to all good governments. Our primary object is, therefore, to win souls to Christ.25

The Count was not persuaded and told Oncken he must leave the country. Oncken wrote in his journal that he found four German Baptists living in St. Petersburg when he arrived. During his time there, eight Russians professed faith in Christ and requested baptism; Oncken got to know them and became convinced of the reality of the profession of seven of them. On the night before he left the city, he baptized the聽seven, the first people to be scripturally baptized in St. Petersburg in modern times.

In 1869 Oncken again visited Russia, this time penetrating far into the interior (as far as Odessa), visiting hundreds of villages, and preaching the gospel hundreds of times. Many baptisms and several small churches resulted. The travels were extremely difficult and physically taxing (he was 69 years old), but the Lord preserved him. From Russia he visited Bulgaria and Romania, meeting brethren in each country and preaching the gospel.

The believers in Russia鈥攅specially Southern Russia鈥攅xperienced severe persecution, and many Baptists found themselves in Russian prisons. Oncken persuaded his Baptist friends in England to approach Dean Stanley of the Anglican Church about this persecution. When Czar Alexander II visited London in 1874, Stanley approached the Czar鈥檚 entourage about the persecution, and the result was the almost complete ending of the persecutions until the Czar鈥檚 death.

Oncken also baptized and trained the church planters who founded the first Baptist churches in Romania and the upper Balkans.

In 1853 Oncken traveled to America. Shortly after his arrival, while traveling by train between New York and Boston, he was involved in a tragic accident, in which the train plummeted into a ravine. He was injured and experienced head pain for years afterward, but his life was remarkably spared. Over fifty fellow passengers died in the crash.

Despite the injuries sustained, he continued his ministry across America. In a letter to his home church, Oncken admitted that he felt great apprehension every time he got on聽a train thereafter, but he coveted their prayers for him as he reckoned he had about 10,000 miles of travel ahead of him in the U.S. before he could return home. Preaching among German immigrants, he helped establish a strong German Baptist Church, which spread rapidly across America. Before returning to Germany, he had consecrated 48 German church planters to work among the immigrants in America. One of the men baptized with Oncken by Barnas Sears in 1834 was J. H. Krueger. Krueger preceded Oncken to America in 1852 and planted a German Baptist church in Peoria, Illinois. The grandparents of my friend and colleague, Dr. Fred Moritz, raised their family in that church.

What kind of man was J. G. Oncken? Despite his complete lack of formal theological training, like Spurgeon, Moody, Bob Jones, and many others, he was burdened that young German Christians have an opportunity for ministerial training. In 1848 he began training young men for ministry, developing courses of study that included grammar, theology, and church history. Gradually, demand grew, leading to the birth of Hamburg Baptist Seminary in 1880. The school continued to train pastors for several generations.

An episode in 1855 gives a taste of his personality. Oncken visited Spurgeon shortly after the young preacher became pastor of New Park Street Church in London. He asked James Spurgeon, Charles鈥� brother, to arrange an interview. Spurgeon sent back word that he had no time for chats, saying, in typical Spurgeon fashion, that if the angel Gabriel asked for a chat, he鈥檇 say, 鈥淕ladly, after I go to heaven.鈥� Oncken returned a response that he 鈥渁sked not for a chat but to lay before him the case of himself and his eighty fellow labourers, and he demanded an interview in their name and in the name of their common Master and for the promotion of His cause.鈥� Spurgeon met with Oncken, and New Park Street Church took on the Hamburg mission for 90聽pounds a year. Spurgeon and Oncken had a warm friendship from then on.26

Oncken, of course, was not perfect. Eventually, his strong leadership led to contention, and churches had to assert their autonomy. This controversy is known as the Hamburg Streit. Oncken argued that the Hamburg church was the 鈥渕other church,鈥� and other churches should affiliate with her as daughters. K枚bner and Lehmann wisely argued for autonomous Baptist churches. As he aged, Oncken appears to have become somewhat autocratic. Fortunately, Oncken鈥檚 successor in Hamburg was able to patch things up, avoiding a rupture in the Baptist Union.27

At the age of 79, Oncken suffered a stroke from which he only slowly recovered. By this time, he had relinquished his headship over the book depot, the mission, and the church. Dr. Bickel, a German who had studied at Rochester Theological Seminary and served a pastorate in the US, succeeded him as head of the German Mission. Oncken鈥檚 successor as pastor of the Hamburg Baptist Church was Mr. Kemnitz. In 1881 Oncken retired to Zurich. He suffered from ill health for several years but lived to age 83, dying on January 2, 1884.

Conclusion

Cooke reports the following results of Oncken鈥檚 work:

At the time of his death the statistics of the Union of German Baptists showed more than 150 churches, with 31,438 members, and 17,000 children in Sunday Schools.聽This does not give the entire results, for there had been formed Baptist centres in Austria, Bulgaria, Roumania [sic], Hungary, Poland, Holland, Switzerland, Trans-Caucasia, and throughout Russia. German Baptist churches had also been planted in South Africa, in the United States, some outlying places on the American Continent, and one in the neighbourhood of Mount Ararat, all really the outcome of Mr. Oncken鈥檚 work. Still later reports show that God is blessing the work by its continuance with greater success and more rapid advance than ever, so that at the time this book is written there are in connection with the German Baptist Union 280 churches with 1222 preaching stations, having a total membership of 54,000; 771 Sunday Schools with 31,500 scholars. Emenating [sic] from the small beginnings in Hamburg, the movement has spread into Denmark, Russia, and Poland, and in each of these countries there are now Baptist Unions with a total membership of about 60,000 grouped in 173 churches.28

Statistics, however, are not the whole story. Oncken passionately believed in discipleship: one believer multiply-ing his influence by investing in others, who can then do the same. Historian Leon McBeth called Oncken a 鈥渙ne-man mission society, theological seminary, and literature distribution center. Seldom has one person contributed so much to the development of a denomination, nor left his stamp more indelibly upon it.鈥�29 This is a just statement, but Oncken alone clearly could not have achieved such results. Oncken taught his converts that every Baptist is a missionary, and the work spread across Continental Europe like fire in the prairie. Oncken was truly the 鈥淭he Father of Continental Baptists鈥� by being a disciple-making disciple.

Let us give Oncken the last word, written to his son William from New York in 1854:

“You must not be discouraged in your Christian course by the discovery of your sinful propensities鈥攖hese will be gradually more fully revealed to you. God does not convert the sinner, to show to him how good he is, but how weak, helpless, sinful and depraved he is, that thus all self-dependence may be destroyed. But then the Spirit of Christ who teaches us this bitter lesson concerning ourselves, also shows us from the Holy Scriptures what a gracious, faithful and almighty Saviour we have, and that through the grace and strength of Him we can do all things. The two great truths which from the day of our conversion to the day we enter into heaven the Lord teaches those who shall be saved are in reference to ourselves that we are poor, lost, helpless sinners, who, if left to themselves, must perish for ever, and in reference to God, that out of boundless compassion He has sent His only begotten Son into the world to atone for the guilt of all who should believe in Him, and then in this glorious Saviour more鈥攊nfinitely more鈥攈as been brought back to all who believe in Him, than ever was lost by Adam鈥檚 transgression and our own sin. . . . Oh, how would my heart rejoice if God should prepare you to enter in and continue the blessed work in Germany when I shall have been removed from the field of labour. There is, after all, nothing great on earth, my dear Willy, but to glorify God in our own salvation, and then to be honoured in saving others.”30

1 Dr. David Saxon is Professor of Bible and Church History at 海角原创.
2 Most of the biographical details come from the only English-language biography of Oncken: John Hunt Cooke, Johann Gerhard Oncken: His Life and Work (London: S. W. Partridge & Co., 1908).
3 Cooke, 16.
4 Cooke, 26.
5 Sears went on to become successively president of Newton Theological Seminary and Brown University.
6 Cooke, 49.
7 H. Leon McBeth, The Baptist Heritage (Nashville: Broadman, 1987), 471.
8 Cooke, 230鈥�231.
9 Cooke, 90.
10 Wayne A. Detzler, 鈥淛ohann Gerhard Oncken鈥檚 Long Road to Toleration,鈥� JETS 36.2 (June 1993): 231.
11 Ibid., 240.
12 Ibid., 237.
13 Detzler, 240.
14 Charles Haddon Spurgeon, 鈥淶edekiah; or, the Man Who Could Not Say 鈥楴o,鈥欌�� in The Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit, 36, Sermon #2178 (London: Passmore and Alabaster, 1890). Sermon preached March 30, 1890. Quote taken from Baptist History class notes of Dr. Fred Moritz.
15 Detzler, 240.
16 Allan Effa, 鈥淒iaspora Strategist: The Missionary Work of Johann Oncken,鈥� July 2007. 鈥淔eatured Article鈥� at www. globalmissiology.org: 9鈥�10.
17 Cooke, 95.
18 Cooke, 96.
20 Cooke, 127鈥�128.
21 Ibid., 42鈥�43.
22 G. Winfred Hervey, The Story of Baptist Missions in Foreign Lands: From the Time of Carey to the Present Date (St. Louis: C. R. Barns, 1892), 799鈥�803.
23 McBeth, 477鈥�478.
24 Hervey, 807鈥�817.
25 Cooke, 147.
26 Cooke, 159.
27 McBeth, 476.
28 Cooke, 60鈥�61.
29 McBeth, 470.
30 Cooke, 139鈥�141.

Education policy is like any other policy. The only question that really matters is, 鈥淲ho gets the money?鈥� Because whoever has the money will decide where and how children will be educated. 鈥淪chool choice鈥� is the policy that parents鈥攏ot the state鈥攃ontrol the money allotted to educate their children.2

School choice has many justifications. Educationally, it produces a better product. Economically, it costs less. Socially, it reinforces family and non-political 鈥渕ediating鈥� structures. Morally, it permits assertion of fixed standards of conduct. Spiritually, it permits escape from the intellectual schizophrenia that divides the world into six days under one set of rules and a seventh day under another.

These arguments have merit. This article, however, examines school choice as a matter of political philosophy.

Social Questions and Answers by Process: Democratic Education in the Free Market of Ideas

Two fundamental questions confront every society. First, how does society determine what its values and goals will be? That is, what should society be and do? Second, once the first聽question is settled, how are citizens convinced to act in accordance with that decision?

Education, even more than politics, is the primary forum in which America addresses these questions. According to 鈥渃ommon school鈥� mythology, public education is the democratic process by which students both synthesize and assimilate the answers to society鈥檚 great questions. Public schools provide a 鈥渕arket place鈥� free from 鈥減rivate鈥� dogmas where all students participate equally in the give and take of ideas.

By dint of sheer numbers鈥攐ver 90% of American children attend public schools鈥斺�渃ommon schooling鈥� is the dominant philosophy of American education. Even those who dispute that education is the 鈥渟elf-synthesis鈥� of social values must still concede that the whole point of education is to develop knowledge, values, beliefs and habits that will continue to guide students once they reach adulthood.

Fly in the Ointment: The Nature of the Child and Who Will Decide?

Despite our reverence for the 鈥渇ree market of ideas,鈥� there are fundamental problems with the myth. A free intellectual market between students and teachers is no less absurd than a free economic market between adults and children.

In economics, we have the good sense to prohibit such 鈥渂argains.鈥� In education, however, such arrangements are unavoidable, and the values, beliefs and presuppositions projected by teachers are by far the most influential at the exact times when students are least capable of 鈥渋nformed consent鈥� about what they are being taught. Thus the question is not whether children will be influenced, but rather who will do the influencing. The American political system has developed two possible answers to this question of 鈥渟overeignty鈥濃�攅ither the state or the parents will control.

The Dilemma of State-Sovereign Education

Government educationists argue that, as a general rule, the state must be sovereign. Parents simply cannot be trusted to do what is best for society. Left to their own ways, they will choose individualistic educations for their children, which perpetuate their own bigotries at the expense of the common good. Private schools are undemocratic by their very nature, selectively discriminating against both people and ideas.3 Common schools, on the other hand, if appropriately managed, ensure that children learn to value equality, tolerance, and the general interests of the collective. Social stability simply cannot exist unless a substantial majority of citizens participate in the unifying, democratizing experience of the 鈥渃ommon school.鈥�

Public schools are thus both the foundation of American democracy and indispensable to its preservation. As a matter of public policy, therefore, public education must remain the only viable option for the vast majority of children.

The union of government and school, however, contains an inherent conflict. The essence of government is聽compulsion鈥攁 fact at odds with the ideal of self-determination and free thought which is the essence of free society.

[S]ome scholars have suggested that any government seeking legitimacy must preserve the liberal postulates of the autonomous individual and the value-neutral state. Any attempt to indoctrinate 鈥渙fficial鈥� values is inconsistent with the perspective of individual autonomy and, therefore, ought to weaken legitimacy. Inculcating values in children, however, is both essential and unavoidable, even in the public schools. The first amendment therefore functions, at best, only to protect the appearance of individual autonomy. Yet by preserving such appearances, government can retain its legitimacy while permitting official and private power elites to socialize and indoctrinate the populace to support 鈥渁ccepted鈥� beliefs.4

Thus, government schools cannot really practice intellec-tual autonomy. Despite the professed value of 鈥渇ree inquiry鈥� and self-determination, collective beliefs and values must predominate鈥攅ven to the extent that the general public must be deceived to maintain the aura of legitimacy on which popular government is based.

The Dilemma of Parent-Sovereign Education

In contrast, school choice recognizes that, historically, parents have been primarily responsible for socialization. Politically, school choice also recognizes that individual freedom must predominate over the collective鈥攖hat the 鈥渕elding experience鈥� of America is freedom itself, not conformity perpetuated under the illusion of autonomy.

Since the family is the most decentralized unit of authority capable of socialization, it is far more likely than the state to perpetuate traditions of individual freedom.聽America survived and prospered without government schools, and a government which practices tolerance in honest fact and not in pretense is the best possible lesson in liberality and acceptance of diversity.5

School choice, however, faces the same social problems as state education. Individuals coexist without compulsion only so long as they share common values and beliefs. Early in America鈥檚 development, that cohesion was produced by a fairly universal conception of social arrangements referred to broadly as 鈥淛udeo-Christianity鈥� or, occasionally, as 鈥減an-Protestantism.鈥�

Government education advocates respond that not only do we no longer have such a dominant worldview within our social and political institutions, it is unconstitutional and repressive to impose such a view upon minority segments of society.6 More extreme advocates even argue that children聽have a right to be educated 鈥渇ree鈥� from such narrow and oppressive beliefs. (Of course, the problem remains that children not educated according to their parents鈥� views will nevertheless be educated according to someone else鈥檚.)

In the last half century, the loss of this pervasive worldview threatens the tribalization of American society unless some other unifying factor takes its place. We must therefore obtain cohesion in some other way, and that way is the democratizing experience of public education.

Examining the Metaphor

The great, Norman Rockwell-esque ideal of American polity is that everyone has an equal opportunity to obtain a hearing for his views in the 鈥渇ree鈥� market of ideas鈥攁 鈥渘eutral鈥� public arena in which those ideas are challenged and tried, and from which 鈥渢ruth鈥� emerges based on the merits of the ideas alone. Because this public arena is a 鈥渇ree鈥� forum, ideas perish or prevail solely on their own merits, not on the ability of their holders to maintain a captive audience insulated from opposing views.

In Abrams v. United States (1919), Justice Holmes coined the 鈥渕arket鈥� metaphor to express his faith in this free exchange of ideas. 鈥淸T]he best test of truth is the power of thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the market.鈥� (In Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc., a later court revealed more clearly the premise implicit in such a market: 鈥淯nder the First Amendment there is no such thing as a false idea.鈥�7)

The 鈥渕arket of ideas鈥� is a powerful metaphor, implying similarity with, and borrowing luster from, the American free market鈥攖he most powerful economic engine in the history of the world. And since that metaphor is the primary聽justification for transferring authority from parents to state, it is imperative to determine whether it is really apt.

Markets and the Limitation of Ideas

The Nature of Markets

Markets of any nature, whether intellectual, economic, artistic, and so on, are aggregates of human action. They are amoral, merely reflecting the characters and aptitudes of the specific individuals that comprise them.

Economic markets, for example, do not guarantee technological or material 鈥減rogress.鈥� They merely facilitate progress if the market players are capable of and inclined to such a thing. Historically, some cultures have achieved material and technological progress, some have not.

Likewise, intellectual markets guarantee neither moral nor intellectual progress. They merely reflect the morality, intelligence, character and acumen of those able and permitted to participate in them. As with economic progress, some cultures have achieved intellectual progress, some have not.

Thus, an intellectual market provides no inherent guarantee that the ideas which prevail are better or truer or more useful than ideas which fail. Unquestioning faith in the 鈥渕arket of ideas鈥� is merely an implicit, self-laudatory assessment that its participants are wise, capable and honest seekers, unburdened with anti-intellectual concerns about votes, egos, biases, profits, reputations, pensions, or book royalties.

The Nature of Freedom

Examining the 鈥渕arket鈥� metaphor also requires a look at 鈥渇reedom,鈥� because 鈥渇reedom of speech鈥� and 鈥渁cademic freedom鈥� are inseparable from the 鈥渕arket of ideas.鈥� Political considerations have gotten us into the habit of qualitative nomenclature such as the 鈥渇ree world,鈥� but freedom is聽relative and subjective. Bluntly, freedom is the ability to do what one wishes. It is the ability to act鈥攖o do.

This definition may offend moral sensibilities, because we customarily (and commendably) associate a moral content with personal freedom, usually asking 鈥渙ught we?鈥� as well as 鈥渃an we?鈥� But freedom is separable from morality. A despot may be evil, but he is certainly more free (in the usual sense of the word) than the martyr whom he holds in prison.

When evaluating the 鈥渇ree market of ideas,鈥� therefore, we must bear in mind that any exclusion or restriction of a point of view is, to the degree of the limitation, an admission that we really do not believe in the efficacy of a totally unrestricted intellectual market.

Notwithstanding, American jurisprudence has developed the dubious distinction between freedom of 鈥渢hought鈥� and freedom of 鈥渁ction.鈥� Again, however, the freedom to act is the only freedom that really makes much difference. A prisoner has complete freedom to think whatever he chooses, but he certainly is not 鈥渇ree鈥� to speak or to act as we ordinarily use that term.

Inherent Limitations

Following from the preceding discussion, it is obvious that there is simply no universal 鈥渕arket鈥� in which all are 鈥渇ree鈥� and able to participate and in which all ideas and points of view are considered equally and 鈥渨ithout bias.鈥� Every market of any kind, especially the market of ideas, reflects inherent human limitations.

In his seminal essay, Individualism and Economic Order, F.A. Hayek wrote,

The peculiar character of the problem of rational economic order is determined precisely by the fact that the knowledge of the circumstances of which we must make use never exists in concentrated or integrated form but solely as the dispersed bits of incomplete and frequently聽contradictory knowledge which all the separate individuals possess.8

To the obvious rejoinder that experts in a field can be assembled to provide the 鈥渂est鈥� opinions, he replied, 鈥淸T]his is of course merely shifting the difficulty to the problem of selecting the experts.鈥�

Even more important, markets do not guarantee a 鈥渘eutral鈥� search for truth. We are accustomed to claims of 鈥渙bjectivity鈥� and 鈥渘eutrality,鈥� but only an omniscient God could be truly 鈥渘eutral,鈥� unburdened by circumstances of time and perspective. Hayek continued,

What I wish to point out is that, even assuming that this problem can be readily solved, it is only a small part of the wider problem.

. . . . [A] little reflection will show that there is beyond question a body of very important but unorganized knowledge . . . the knowledge of the particular circum-stances of time and place.9

Again, there is no such thing as a 鈥渦niversal鈥� market. If 鈥渢ruth鈥� is a function of the market, then truth is merely the accident of time and place. Thus, the more loudly a speaker proclaims his unbiased ability to consider all points of view, the more surely he is a sycophant or, worse, a self-deluded ignoramus incognizant of his own intellectual and moral limitations.

Education and the Limitation of Ideas

Felt Presuppositions and Worldview

Every cohesive society has some worldview or belief system which its individual members hold more or less in common. Not every individual engages in systematic reflection on reality, life and meaning, of course, but everyone still has some conception of reality on which he bases his actions and decisions.

Such conceptions are based on intuitions about the nature of things: how to tell right from wrong, what is 鈥渢rue,鈥� how things 鈥渙ught鈥� to be, and so on. These fundamental intuitions I will call 鈥渇elt presuppositions鈥� because every belief system is ultimately based on 鈥渟elf-evident鈥� presuppositions which are assumed and not proven. Such intuitions are articles of quasi-religious faith, in some respects insusceptible to reason and experience, the customary means of proof.10

For example, no beliefs are more fundamental to western civilization than the notions that all men are 鈥渃reated鈥� equal, that all possess inalienable rights, and that such rights include life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Yet despite the indispensability of these notions, some of the most brilliant minds in history claimed only 鈥渟elf-evidence鈥� in their support.

In sum, though felt presuppositions are ultimately insusceptible to 鈥渁bsolute鈥� proof, they are nevertheless vital because they govern the approaches we take and the conclusions we make when confronted with social problems.

Primacy of Elementary Education

Education is not merely 鈥渢echnical鈥� learning objectives and the experiences designed to achieve them. Instead, it is聽the sum total of the learner鈥檚 experiences鈥攁ll environmental influences which affect his thoughts and actions.

The 鈥渁ctors鈥� which control that environment always communicate some worldview. It is impossible to engage in any kind of human action (education in particular) without evincing some conception of 鈥渢he way things are.鈥� That conception may be coherent or chaotic, intentional or inadvertent. It need not even be communicated consciously, but it is communicated nonetheless.

Through this process, children intuitively come to 鈥渒now鈥� certain felt presuppositions when they are young and least able to understand what is being done to them. Transmission of a worldview is almost always implicit. Only rarely is a teacher aware of what he is doing, and even more rarely is he honest enough to state explicitly the presuppositions he is attempting to teach.

Consider the familiar issue of 鈥渞eligion and state.鈥� When authority figures in government schools consider all matters of human significance without reference to God, students cannot help but conclude intuitively that government considers theistic beliefs irrelevant. Thus the subconscious predispositions of generations of students have been imbued with the state鈥檚 operational assumptions that neither the probability nor the consequences of God鈥檚 existence are of sufficient magnitude to factor into their behavioral calculations.

I am unconcerned here with whether it is rational, ethical or constitutional to include theological concerns in public education or public policy decisions. I only point out that one set of predispositions is being advanced and another rejected under a fundamentally dishonest guise of 鈥渘eutrality.鈥�

The 鈥渞eligion鈥� question is probably the most familiar instance of creating subrational predispositions, but the identical process goes on in much more subtle ways regarding virtually all subjects and ideas. Given the nature of the child, it is impossible for such a process not to occur. However, educators and power elites should at least聽acknowledge that their asserted 鈥渇ree market of ideas鈥� and 鈥渄emocratic processes鈥� are, to a degree, disingenuous.

Education and the Control of Ideas

The Democratic Ideal

John Dewey made it clear that America would look to democratic education to establish social goals and achieve loyalty to them. In My Pedagogic Creed he stated,

By law and punishment, by social agitation and discussion, society can regulate and form itself in a more or less haphazard and chance way. But through education society can formulate its own purposes, can organize its own means and resources, and thus shape itself with definiteness and economy in the direction in which it wishes to move.11

Dewey believed that children would be naturally loyal to democratic decisions in which they themselves participated.

I believe that the only true education comes through the stimulation of the child鈥檚 powers by the demands of the social situations in which he finds himself. Through these demands he is stimulated to act as a member of a unity, to emerge from his original narrowness of action and feeling and to conceive of himself from the standpoint of the welfare of the group to which he belongs.12

Thus Dewey believed that the school should replace all other social institutions as the primary determinant of social goals and values.

Economic Limitations

Despite Dewey鈥檚 mystic reverence for democratic education, the idea of an 鈥渋ntellectual free market鈥� in government schools has serious problems. A 鈥渇ree鈥� economic market is, by definition, one in which government regulation is minimized. Government exists only to maintain the rules of the market, and participation is based on persuasion, not legal compulsion. In contrast, American public education is one of the most pervasive monopolies in history, controlling by law almost all dollars available for education. The mere fact that disposable income is taken for government education means that most families are deprived of freedom to choose an alternative.

Only the wealthier or most sacrificial parents have any choice other than state-provided education. Thus, govern-ment deprives the great majority of the public of free choice merely by eliminating their capacity to choose anything else. Religious education is an obvious example. Strict separationists talk about the 鈥渨all of separation,鈥� but for the last 150 years, government has extended its 鈥渨all鈥� at breakneck pace. Not only has its rapacious jurisdictional appetite consumed one enclave of the public life after another, its voracious economic appetite has devoured ever increasing percentages of private wealth (through taxes, inflation and regulation) to fund the advance.

It is ironic that those advocates most willing to fall from the edge of the world defending a student鈥檚 ineffable right to wear a smutty t-shirt are oblivious to Leviathan鈥檚 economic annihilation of personal liberty. These same advocates generally labor indefatigably erecting an impermeable wall of separation between church and state, yet they are oblivious to the rampant destruction of the most important constitutional wall of all鈥攖hat between government and citizen. In fact, the very justification for government taxation and control of education is the fear of what parents might do if left to their own devices. Thus, while government education might conceivably be justified on other grounds, borrowing聽metaphoric luster from free economic markets is unwarranted and disingenuous.

Systemic Limitations

In government schools themselves, the 鈥渕arket of ideas鈥� is supposedly guarded by 鈥渁cademic freedom,鈥� and we reflexively envision government education as an open forum. Whatever discretion a teacher has, however, exists within a very limited ambit.

A carefully controlled environment is inherent in the idea of school itself, particularly in elementary grades where shaping thought and belief is most critical. Professor Ingber鈥檚 鈥渆lite鈥� decide who will be permitted to teach, which subjects will be taught, which curricula and texts will be used, which teaching methods will be permitted, which books and materials will be available or feted in the library and which will not be purchased.

Political Limitations:聽Truth and the Views of the Dominant Forces

If 鈥渢ruth鈥� is merely a function of the market, then whoever controls the market controls truth. In The Common Law, Justice Holmes was candid about the way society really functions.

So when it comes to the development of a corpus juris, the ultimate question is what do the dominant forces of the community want and do they want it hard enough to disregard whatever inhibitions may stand in the way.13

This conclusion is disturbingly consistent with Ingber鈥檚 views that the first amendment functions best as a subterfuge, preserving the appearance of individual autonomy so that the general populace do not suspect official聽and private power elites of indoctrinating students to support 鈥渁ccepted鈥� beliefs.鈥�

GOVERNMENT-DOMINANT EDUCATION: PERPETUATING THE ILLUSION

State Sovereignty and the Market

The Illusion of Competition

As we have seen, an 鈥渋ntellectual market鈥� of six-year olds is ludicrous. Elementary and secondary government schooling is not at all about preserving the market of ideas in larger society, it is about restricting that market to establish ideas which government hopes will persevere into adulthood. Government education exists precisely to prevent an adult population with unacceptably diverse ideas.

As Ingber points out, however, this restriction must be accomplished as a subterfuge to perpetuate the apparent legitimacy of the 鈥減opular鈥� state. Government education has dishonestly turned its greatest weakness鈥攖he deliberate exclusion and suppression of impermissibly divergent ideas鈥攊nto its greatest propaganda piece: the preservation of 鈥渋ntellectual freedom鈥� and 鈥渄iversity.鈥�

In light of this mindset, the advent of 鈥減olitical correctness鈥� should hardly shock. It is a direct result of people educated in a system based on exclusion of ideas in the name of neutrality and tolerance. The result of such a system may well be the greatest intolerance of all: a society full of people who in good conscience deliberately exclude viewpoints (and their adherents) from meaningful participation in social processes鈥攁ll in the name of tolerance, liberalism and open-mindedness which they believe they truly possesses.

The Illusion of Self-Determination

Government education controls ideas in least three specific ways. The first is obvious. In most states, for聽example, schools must teach specifically in favor of democratic processes and against antagonistic processes such as communism or socialism. Other more controversial regulations require teaching of human growth and development, environmental education, values clarification, outcome-based education, and so on.

Second, and less overt, is the deliberate exclusion of theistic belief. Though most teachers are unaware, it is still legally permissible to teach 鈥渁bout鈥� religion. But it has been held violative of the First Amendment for a teacher to say, 鈥淚 believe.鈥� While the system permits authority figures to model approved beliefs, it absolutely prohibits the modeling of other beliefs. One who believes that this kind of policy is 鈥渘eutral鈥� toward theistic belief would probably enjoy a football game in which one team is not permitted on the field.

Third, and least discernible of all, is the effect of the inherently cynical character of the market process itself discussed below.

Products of the Process

By disguising the philosophical presuppositions on which it is based, American public education perpetuates perhaps the most restricted experience of all鈥攐ne in which the child is manipulated to accept certain presuppositions without any awareness of the implicit forces and ideas which have shaped his thinking.

Specifically, this means that any 鈥渄ivisive鈥� beliefs must yield to the common democratic good. Thomas Jefferson once wrote to a director of the University of Virginia,

By bringing the sects together, and mixing them with the mass of other students, we shall soften their asperities, liberalize and neutralize their prejudices, and make the general religion a religion of peace, reason, and morality.14

Jefferson鈥檚 vision has been remarkably powerful, and the deliberate substitution of democratic process for individual belief has historically been dubbed America鈥檚 鈥渃ivil religion.鈥�

Civil Religion and Displacement of Theistic Principle

One familiar result of American civil religion is the progressive exclusion from public life of those with theistic viewpoints. At the beginning of our constitutional history, the free exercise clause actually meant something. Whether or not the wall of separation was a valid metaphor in our early history, it still was of little significance because government (federal government in particular) had very little to do with lives of citizens.

Over time, however, government has expanded into more and more areas of the public life previously reserved to private action. Concurrently, the United States Supreme Court developed the 鈥渨all of separation鈥� doctrine, which prohibits integration of theistic beliefs and governmental activity. The result is that as government keeps 鈥渕oving the wall,鈥� individuals acting out of a theistic worldview are necessarily 鈥渜uarantined鈥� in a few limited, ever-shrinking sectors of the public life.

As these principles filtered down into elementary and secondary schools, it inevitably resulted in the now-dominant view that religion is of purely private concern and has no place in public life. What Jefferson viewed as the 鈥渟oftening of asperities,鈥� others view as the removal of objective cultural standards by which to judge and restrict government action.

Civil Religion and Displacement of Moral Principle

The removal of transcendent religious principle from public life has been a high profile affair. Much less noticeably, however, democratic education has also removed traditional moral and civil standards by its disastrous merging of morality and legality.

Popular savants bemoan the loss of 鈥渃ivility,鈥� but that phenomenon is to be expected. Morality and civility have traditionally been a function of private authority imposing standards of conduct thought to be rational and desirable, making possible the learning of moral and social codes more restrictive than those imposed by government.

However, since the Viet Nam era Tinker case, government schools are prevented from imposing behavioral standards higher than the 鈥渙uter limits of legality鈥� prescribed by the Constitution. Thus, as social limits have become identical to legal limits during children鈥檚 formative years, behavior has tended ineluctably toward the lowest common denominator.
A fearful by-product of the 鈥渓egalization鈥� of America is that the American public now views government as the only legitimate source of limitation on personal freedom. A free society, however, is based on self control, not imposed control. Once government is seen as the only legitimate sanction remaining, society is one small step from a police state.

Civil Religion and De Facto Cynicism

This removal of transcendent principle is not new, however. In the fourth century B.C., the Cynics first formulated the organized doctrine that the ultimate nature of reality is unknowable. Therefore, instead of wasting time speculating about knowledge impossible to obtain, Cynics devoted themselves strictly to 鈥渢his worldly鈥� concerns. (鈥淰irtue鈥� was still in vogue, and the Cynic Diogenes walked about with a lantern looking for an honest man.)

In more recent times, Hume and Kant much more thoroughly demolished any confidence that ultimate reality is knowable. Prior to their work, epistemology had always been subsequent to cosmology. Hume and Kant reversed the order. Without the assumption of the efficacy of reason, it became increasingly obvious that nothing could be known 鈥渇or sure.鈥�

Augustus Comte provided an historical characterization for these views. Man鈥檚 early, ignorant stage was 鈥渞eligious鈥� in which he looked for truth through revelation. Man鈥檚 second stage was 鈥減hilosophical鈥� in which he looked for ultimate answers through speculative reason. Finally, man has now reached the enlightened 鈥渟cientific鈥� stage in which the only knowledge of significance is empirical and experiential.

As logic took its course, Cynicism led to Sophism. And just as the Cynics in ancient times, modern education鈥攑articularly elementary education where it most counts鈥攈as totally abandoned any search for ultimate meaning, either religiously or philosophically. Elementary and secondary curricula are utterly devoid of any discussion of the nature of truth or questions of ultimate significance. Hastened by public education鈥檚 removal of objective religious and moral principles from consideration, the same skepticism now dominates modern intellectual life. The significance of this void is not so much that students intentionally disbelieve in transcendent principles, but rather that they intuitively absorb the state鈥檚 operant presuppositions that such concerns are irrelevant and inappropriate. State education thus teaches students its own brand of institutional cynicism. Far more deadly than producing students without some faith or belief in the nature of things, this system produces students without even the capability of recognizing their own narrow presuppositions.

For 鈥減hilosophers,鈥� such cynicism may be a functional way to live. But as a practical matter for society, it destroys the very fabric on which the vast majority of society has traditionally based their lives and by which self-restraint has seemed reasonable. Like the Cynics, American society is obsessed exclusively with 鈥渢his worldly鈥� concerns. Unlike the Cynics, however, 鈥渧irtue鈥� is not still in vogue.

PARENT-DOMINANT EDUCATION: ACKNOWLEDGING REALITY

Parental Sovereignty and the Market

Acknowledging Personal Limits

School choice does not engage in disingenuous posturing about 鈥渦nbiased鈥� and 鈥渘eutral鈥� education. It acknowledges human limitations, readily admitting that the universal cannot be replicated in the individual. It demands for parents the personal liberty to engage in individual decisions about education and permits other parents the same liberty.

Competition among Equals

School choice posits a market of ideas no less than public education. However, school choice is honest in recognizing that an intellectual market is meaningless among children generally lacking the intellectual sophistication and moral constitution to believe and do other than what they are told.

In contrast to the phony market advertised by government education, the market of ideas proposed by school choice is meaningful鈥攐ne in which a would-be educator must convince a competent adult that the educator鈥檚 particular approach to education is most suited for that parent鈥檚 child. Like their counterparts in the economic market, the 鈥渟ellers鈥� of education must convince the 鈥渂uyers鈥� that purchase of a particular product is the best possible use of the buyer鈥檚 resources.

Products of the Process

School choice accomplishes the ideal which state education only professes鈥攑reventing imposition of official 鈥渟tate doctrine.鈥� With choice, parents have the actual capability to obtain an education based on transcendent spiritual or moral presuppositions rather than the cynicism of the government monopoly. It makes possible real intellectual and cultural diversity.

Still, choice does not ignore the need for social cohesion. The real melding experience of America was and is freedom.15 A free society best obtains tolerance by exhibiting tolerance鈥攏ot by surreptitiously repressing real diversity.

A SUGGESTION FOR ACTION: TAKING THE OFFENSIVE

The Retreat

Individualists are at a disadvantage against statists because they have inherent reservations about employing political force rather than individual persuasion. In contrast, statists believe government compulsion is fundamentally moral to modify and shape otherwise free choices of citizens.

An individualist鈥檚 inhibitions make it inevitable that he will be more reticent than the statist to use taxation and other forms of official compulsion to impose his views, so the current dominance of government education over individual liberty is understandable.

How then, may individual liberty in education and society be recovered?

The Offensive

Moral and Intellectual Offensive

Fundamental change in popular government usually occurs only when the populace at large believes in the聽fairness or morality of the change. Unfortunately, it is still reflexive among major segments of the population that opposing public education means supporting ignorance. (We have a great deal of work to do.)

The first step of the counter-offensive thus must be to establish that parental sovereignty is the policy truly in keeping with American traditions of personal liberty and tolerance. As to liberty, it is outrageous that government taxes a parent into oblivion, uses that money to educate his child in ways or with views and beliefs with which he disagrees, then bids him go elsewhere if he objects.

As to tolerance, unlike the forced conformity of govern-ment education, school choice both respects intellectual and cultural diversity and preserves its possibility. We should not fear that choice allows other parents to educate their children as strong Moslems or Catholics. Nor should we fear that Black or Hispanic parents will take education into their own hands and produce self-confident children and powerful cultural and economic communities. Instead, we should fear what may happen if such groups are marginalized and manipulated by an unresponsive educational system controlled by elite political interest groups.

School choice is the truly 鈥渄emocratic鈥� process, because it involves virtually every parent in the decision process. Education is no longer the exclusive domain of the elite in charge of government agencies. The real melding experience of America is individual liberty, not imposed conformity masquerading as tolerance.

Legal Offensive

On the legal and constitutional front, we must look to established principles with which the courts are familiar because few successful offensives are mounted as outright assaults on established principle.

First, we must ask courts to give the public 鈥渋ntellectual informed consent.鈥� That is, ask the courts to deal honestly with the philosophical issues. Cease, either deliberately or聽accidentally, from perpetuating the false notion that government schools somehow tolerate unrestricted diversity in an intellectually neutral forum.

Second, the courts must scrutinize their traditional compartmental analyses. The interminable calls for separation of religious and secular functions seem simple enough applied to church and state as discreet corporate entities, but when applied to the real parties in interest鈥攊ndividuals with integrated theistic beliefs鈥攖hey amount to psychological vivisection.

Education is not easily divisible into discreet 鈥渞eligious鈥� and 鈥渘on-religious鈥� functions. Virtually every comprehensive religion speaks to social and political questions as well as to purely 鈥渟piritual鈥� concerns. If both theistic and non-theistic belief systems address the same issues, it is hardly 鈥渘eutral鈥� to exclude one set of views from consideration.

The greater the effort necessary to parse the conjunction of church and state in education, the more obvious it should be that such issues may be nonjusticiable. School choice solves the problem鈥攏ot by providing better legal analysis, but by eliminating education as a 鈥渟tate action鈥� altogether.

Buying education with a voucher is itself no more an establishment of state religion than buying kosher with food stamps or a social security check. That a significant number of parents would purchase education from a religious provider simply proves that education is a religiously integrated enterprise for a great number of people鈥攐ne in which the state鈥檚 secular monopoly amounts to invidious discrimination and religious disestablishment on a massive scale.
Third, it is customary to speak of 鈥渁ccommodating鈥� religious people. This presupposes that it is the state which is legitimate and that the individual believing parent must go like a mendicant, hat in hand, begging for something which legitimately belongs to the state.

In truth, it is the state which has distorted the normal equilibrium of human action. Left alone to make their own聽economic decisions, a great percentage of the populace would seek religious or morally distinctive educations. It is incredibly cynical to claim that school choice will have a 鈥渞eligious effect鈥� when in reality it would merely facilitate the restoration of cultural equilibrium. School choice merely allows the public to do with their money what they would have done anyway had government not taxed it away to begin with.

Fourth, we must cease viewing individuals, religious or not, as members of ostracized factions at war with each other. Citizens voluntarily associate in groups based on race, religion, ethnic background, labor interests and political interests. Unless checked, the state through economic and political pressure will gain the ability to eradicate free choices which make such individual distinctions possible. The real war is not between the 鈥減ublic鈥� and religious or ethnic minorities, but between the state and individual citizens.

Fifth, the courts must recognize that individual and familial liberties are meaningless if government succeeds in destroying citizens鈥� economic ability to exercise them. A government is despotic in direct proportion to the extent that it taxes away the economic ability of the people to speak, associate, assemble, publish or practice religion. If government taxes away the marginal ability of individual citizens to engage in those vital functions, their exercise will become the exclusive domains of massive corporations, foundations, trade organizations and bureaucracies economically powerful enough to overcome governmental impediments.

Without too much exaggeration, the fundamental evil challenged by the American Revolution鈥攅conomic dominance of government over private citizen鈥攊s virtually lost in the modern civil libertarian鈥檚 weird fascination with felons and topless dancers. The courts must be re-sensitized to government鈥檚 economic threat to liberty. Once sensitized, they will be much less reticent to accept policies which return a measure of control to individuals.

Political Offensive

Government education proponents have masterfully succeeded in building a quasi-religious devotion to government schooling. Once that devotion has been tempered by exposing the fallacies of the system, it will be much easier for individual members of the public to understand that their best interests are served by deciding themselves how to spend their own money.

It is unrealistic to believe that government will cease funding education. So as long as government remains in that business, the ideal mechanism would be 鈥淚ndividual Education Accounts,鈥� which provide each child with a fixed dollar amount for education based on the child鈥檚 particular educational needs. Funds not used for a current year would be rolled over into an individual account and made available for post-secondary technical, professional or academic training.

Such a device gives parents a real incentive to maximize results and minimize cost. Once accustomed to actually making their own decisions with their own money, parents will never go 鈥渂ack to the farm.鈥�

CONCLUSION

It is statists who are terrorized by real diversity. They are more than willing to sacrifice history鈥檚 greatest experiment in liberty for the security of the hive. Educational choice is not the end of intellectual and cultural diversity; it is the last, best hope for its preservation.

Educational choice is truly the greatest public policy issue of the century. Who controls the schools, controls the future.

1 Michael D. Dean, Esq., is the General Counsel for First Freedoms Foundation, Inc.

2 It is beyond the scope of this paper to discuss whether the state should be involved in education at all. At present, there is no realistic possibility that it will remove itself, so this paper deals only with the practical political situation as it actually exists.

3 Although it also beyond the scope of this paper to discuss the sociological aspects of school choice, a brief comment is necessary because the charges of racism against school choice are so pervasive.

As a practical matter, the vision of Brown v. Board of Education (1954) is largely unrealized. The great enclaves of segregation are still urban public schools, not private schools. Court-ordered integration has often exacerbated social problems and created new ones more intractable than ever.

In contrast to 鈥渢op down鈥� solutions to social problems, school choice recognizes that it is beyond the right or ability of government to know what is best for every child. Because school choice is 鈥渃onsumer driven,鈥� it facilitates creation of a wider variety of schools from which parents may select the education most appropriate for their children.

4 Stanley Ingber, 鈥淪ocialization, Indoctrination, or the 鈥楶all of Orthodoxy鈥�: Value Training in the Public Schools,鈥� University of Illinois Law Review 1 (1987): 71.

5 The recent fervor for 鈥渕ulticulturalism鈥� in government schools is, to a great degree, the guilt reflex of the very institutions which for decades attempted to eradicate diversity. (As with earlier 鈥渢op down鈥� integration policies, these efforts have also been frequently counter-productive, even in purely social terms.)
The landmark parents鈥� rights cases resulted from state efforts to impose uniformity. In Pierce v. Society of Sisters, a Supreme Court generally considered 鈥渞eactionary鈥� declared that children were not 鈥渕ere creatures of the state鈥� and held unconstitutional Oregon鈥檚 attempt to force all children to attend government schools. In Meyer v. Nebraska, the same Court held unconstitutional a Nebraska law prohibiting teaching of the German language, the purpose of which was to subjugate German cultural heritage.

6 One might argue with some justification that the loss of a general Judeo-Christian worldview and resulting cultural Balkanization are the direct results of two government policies. (1) Constitutional decisions in the 40鈥檚, 50鈥檚 and 60鈥檚 purposely disestablished that view from American schools and, ultimately, from American society. (2) Government first enforced slavery of blacks, then deliberately segregated them and other minorities from participation and opportunity in society鈥攆requently with the聽apparent sanction of those claiming a Judeo-Christian worldview 鈥攍eading inevitably (and understandably) to caustic resentment against Judeo-Christianity and society by those unjustly excluded.

7 The troubling corollary of such a proposition is that there is no such thing as true idea, either.

8 F. A. Hayek, Individualism and Economic Order (Chicago: University of Chicago, 1948), 77.

9 Ibid., 80.

10 This is not to discount natural law bases of common reason and experience, nor is it to take sides in the debate between 鈥渃lassical鈥� and 鈥減resuppositionalist鈥� philosophy and apologetics. But classical natural law thinkers, pagan Cicero and Christian Aquinas among them, did refer frequently to 鈥渞ecta ratio,鈥� not 鈥渟ola ratio.鈥� Even more basic, they began with the 鈥渟elf-evident鈥� assumptions that there is such a thing as 鈥渞eason鈥� and that 鈥渞eason is reasonable.鈥�

11 John Dewey, My Pedagogic Creed (New York: E. L. Kellog, 1897), 17.

12 Ibid., 3.

13 Oliver Wendell Holmes, His Books, Notices, and Uncollected Papers, ed. Harry C. Shriver (New York: Central Book, 1936), 187.

14 Herbert Baxter Adam, Thomas Jefferson and the University of Virginia (Washington: Government Printing Office (1888), 91.

15 In addition to mere liberty, commonly accepted moral and behavioral restraints are also indispensable to what the founding fathers called 鈥渙rdered liberty.鈥� It is beyond the scope of this paper to discuss how common moral assumptions arise apart from government compulsion. As only one example, C.S. Lewis noted moral axioms common to all religions which he called the Tao. It is not the selection of a particular set of moral absolutes that makes government education so destructive, but rather the implicit denial that confidence in moral absolutes is even possible.

The Reformation was characterized by at least two distinct movements, the Magisterial Reformation and the Radical Reformation. At the outset it is important to understand the nature of the two groups.

Magisterial Reformation

The Magisterial Reformers are so called because their reform efforts were supported by at least some ruling authorities, or magistrates, and because they believed the civil magistrates ought to enforce the true faith. This term is used to distinguish them from the radical reformers (Anabaptists), whose efforts had no magisterial support. The Reformers are also called 鈥渕agisterial鈥� because the word magister can mean 鈥渢eacher,鈥� and the Magisterial Reformation strongly emphasized the authority of teachers.2

Martin Luther, Ulrich Zwingli and John Calvin are considered Magisterial Reformers because their forms of the reformation movements were supported by the magistrates or the political authorities in their various countries. Frederick the Wise supported Luther while he was a professor at the university he founded, but Frederick also hid聽Luther in Wartburg Castle in Eisenach to protect him from the Roman Catholics. Zwingli and Calvin were both supported by the city councils in their respective cities of Zurich and Geneva.

Since the term 鈥渕agister鈥� also means 鈥渢eacher,鈥� the Magisterial Reformation is also characterized by an emphasis on the authority of a teacher. This is made evident in the prominence of Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli as leaders of the reform movements in their respective areas of ministry. Because of their authority, they were often criticized by Radical Reformers as being too much like the Roman Popes. For example, Radical Reformer Andreas von Bodenstein Karlstadt referred to the Wittenberg theologians as the 鈥渘ew papists.鈥�3

鈥淩adical鈥� Reformers

The Radical Reformation consists of the most diverse group of theologians of any of the other movements. In fact, the only characteristic that all radical reformers share is their rejection of the Catholic Church and the protestant churches. In his classic, The Radical Reformation, George Huntston Williams classified the radicals as Anabaptists, Spiritualists, or Evangelical Rationalists. Anabaptists such as Menno Simons and Balthasar H眉bmaier were pacifists who rejected infant baptism and were strict Biblicists. Caspar Schwenkfeld was a Spiritualist who emphasized the inner witness of the Spirit to such an extent that he rejected the 鈥渆xternal matters鈥� such as baptism and the Lord鈥檚 Supper as unnecessary.

Evangelical Rationalist Michael Servetus emphasized the use of reason in addition to Scripture. This led to his rejection of the Trinity and his execution as a heretic in Geneva.4

We use radical 鈥渙f, 1. relating to, or proceeding from a root: as (a) of or growing from the root of a plant <radical tubers> (b) of, relating to, or constituting a linguistic root; (c) of or relating to a mathematical root; (d) designed to remove the root of a disease or all diseased and potentially diseased tissue <radical surgery> <radical mastectomy> 2. of or relating to the origin: fundamental.鈥�5 Thus, the 鈥渞adical鈥� reformers aimed to build their churches on the 鈥渞oot鈥� of the New Testament model. Philip Schaff describes the difference between the two groups:

The Reformers aimed to reform the old Church by the Bible; the Radicals attempted to build a new Church from the Bible. The former maintained the historic continuity; the latter went directly to the apostolic age, and ignored the intervening centuries as an apostasy. The Reformers founded a popular state-church, including all citizens with their families; the Anabaptists organized on the voluntary principle select congregations of baptized believers, separated from the world and from the State. Nothing is more characteristic of radicalism and sectarianism than an utter want of historical sense and respect for the past. In its extreme form it rejects even the Bible as an external authority, and relies on inward inspiration. This was the case with the Zwickau Prophets who threatened to break up Luther鈥檚 work at Wittenberg.

The Radicals made use of the right of protest against the Reformation, which the Reformers so effectually exercised against popery. They raised a protest against Protestantism. They charged the Reformers with inconsistency and semi-popery; yea, with the worst kind of popery. They denounced the state-church as worldly and corrupt, and its ministers as mercenaries. They were charged in turn with pharisaical pride, with revolutionary and socialistic tendencies. They were cruelly persecuted by imprisonment, exile, torture, fire and sword, and almost totally suppressed in Protestant as well as in Roman聽Catholic countries. The age was not ripe for unlimited religious liberty and congregational self-government. The Anabaptists perished bravely as martyrs of conscience.6

The purpose of this article is to describe the basic tenets of Lutheran theology so Baptist pastors and lay people can better understand the religious setting in which they live and minister.

Similarities between Lutheran and other Reformation Theologies

Similarities exist between Lutheran and other Protestant theologies for several reasons. For one, Lutheran, Covenant, and Anglican theologies are all Augustinian at their source. Another reason for similarities must be that the theme of justification by faith was the dominant theme of the Protestant reformation. 鈥淭he Reformation creeds emphasize in particular those issues that were especially in conflict, such as the doctrines of grace, faith, justification, the church, and sacraments.鈥�7

Historic Lutheran theology finds itself in agreement with the historic creeds of Christendom, and thus in agreement with other Protestant theologies on those points. Thus, the聽heart of Lutheran theology is 鈥渟ola scriptura,鈥� 鈥渟ola gratia,鈥� and 鈥渟ola fide鈥�8 (Scripture alone, grace alone, faith alone).

Lutheran Confessions of Faith

Lutheran Theology also reveals marked distinctions from other Reformation traditions. Lutheran authorities are very clear in answering the question: 鈥淲hat is a Lutheran?鈥� 鈥淲hile there are a variety of ways one could answer this question, one very important answer is simply this, 鈥楢 Lutheran is a person who believes, teaches and confesses the truths of God鈥檚 Word as they are summarized and confessed in the Book of Concord.鈥� The Book of Concord contains the Lutheran confessions of faith.鈥�9 The Book of Concord communicates the heart of Lutheranism.

After Luther鈥檚 death in 1546, significant controversies broke out in the Lutheran Church. After much debate and struggle, the Formula of Concord in 1577 put an end to these doctrinal controversies and the Lutheran Church was able to move ahead united in what it believed, taught and confessed. In 1580, all the confessional writings mentioned here were gathered into a single volume, the Book of Concord. Concord is a word that means, 鈥榟armony.鈥� The Formula of Concord was summarized in a version known as the 鈥楨pitome鈥� of the Formula of Concord. This document too is included in the Book of Concord.10

We understand Lutheran Theology through its doctrinal confessions.

The History of the Lutheran Confessions

The Wisconsin Synod gives a succinct description of the various confessions.

The Small Catechism (1529 AD)11

Martin Luther wrote the Small Catechism as a brief summary of the basic truths of the Christian faith. It was primarily intended to educate the laity and was designed as a tool that parents could use to teach their children. It provides summaries or explanations of the Ten Commandments, the Apostles Creed, the Lord鈥檚 Prayer, the Sacrament of Baptism, the Sacrament of the Altar (Holy Communion), and the Ministry of the Keys and Confession.

The Large Catechism (1529 AD)

Covering in greater depth the same doctrines and subjects as the Small Catechism, the Large Catechism was really a series of edited sermons of Martin Luther. It was intended primarily as a tool that could be used by pastors and teachers to broaden their knowledge of the teachings of the Bible.

The Augsburg Confession (1530 AD)

Written by Luther鈥檚 colleague Philip Melanchthon, this statement of faith is often viewed as the chief Lutheran confession. It was presented by the followers of Luther to Emperor Charles V at the imperial diet (assembly) meeting in Augsburg, Germany. It was intended to be a summary of the chief articles of the Christian faith as understood and taught by Lutherans in contrast to the errors that were being taught by the Roman Catholic Church.

The Apology (Defense) of the Augsburg Confession (1531 AD)

After the Roman theologians had condemned many of the teachings of the Augsburg Confession, Philip Melanchthon authored this lengthy defense of the Augsburg Confession.

Smalcald Articles (1536 AD)

The Smalcald Articles were written by Luther in late 1536 for presentation and discussion at a church council that had been planned by Pope Paul III. On June 4, 1536, Pope Paul III announced that a council would be held to deal with the concerns of the Protestants. In these articles Luther indicated on which points Lutherans would not compromise. Lutherans at once recognized their value as a statement of pure evangelical and biblical doctrine.

The Formula of Concord (1577 AD)

In the years following Luther鈥檚 death, Lutherans had become divided over a number of doctrinal issues. Written primarily by Jacob Andreae, Martin Chemnitz, and David Chytraeus, the Formula of Concord (or 鈥渁greement鈥�) was a detailed restatement of many of the truths contained in the Augsburg Confession and was intended to be a statement that all genuine Lutherans could adopt. It was signed by over 8,100 pastors and theologians, as well as by over 50 governmental leaders. The Solid Declaration is the unabridged version. The Epitome is an abridged version intended for congregations to study.

Distinctive Teachings of Lutheranism

This study will follow the outline of the Augsburg Confession with necessary additions and comments. 鈥淭he Augsburg Confession, in part because of its historical聽significance and in part because of its intrinsic merit, became the most influential of all the Lutheran creeds.鈥�12

鈥淭he first part of the Confession deals with matters of faith and draws on the Schwabach Articles, which had been written by Martin Luther.鈥�13 The confession is essentially a dialogue with Rome. The second half deals with church abuses and makes use of the Torgau Articles, which had been written in preparation for the Augsburg Diet.14

The Confession is divided into two divisions entitled 鈥淭he Chief Articles of Faith鈥� and 鈥淎buses Corrected.鈥�15 A reading of the Confession reveals that the first twenty-one articles were attempting to set forth the faith of the Lutherans in a positive manner and to show that they were in the 鈥渕ainstream鈥� of historic doctrine. The last seven articles reveal the abuses the Lutherans discerned within Roman Catholicism and which they sought to correct.

The Articles of the Augsburg Confession

The first article on 鈥淕od鈥� draws from the Nicene Creed and confesses that God is one, and that He is a Trinity.
The second article on 鈥淥riginal Sin鈥� declares that all men since the fall of Adam are sinners. This article introduces Lutheran sacramentalism and states that the result of sin condemns and brings eternal death 鈥渦pon those not born again through Baptism and the Holy Ghost.鈥�16

The third article on 鈥淭he Son of God鈥� follows the Apostles鈥� Creed and confesses the virgin birth, the deity, death, burial,聽resurrection, and ascension of Christ. It speaks of his present session in heaven and his ministry to believers through the Holy Spirit. It also states belief in the return of Christ to judge the living and the dead. This historic affirmation concerning Christology is the tie to the Lutheran view of the real presence of Christ in the elements of communion. The full deity and full humanity of Christ is a mystery, and Lutherans view the real presence of Christ in the 鈥渟acramental union鈥� as a mystery in the same way.17

The fourth article on 鈥淛ustification鈥� states the great truth of justification by faith in Christ鈥檚 finished work. 鈥淎lso they teach that men cannot be justified before God by their own strength, merits, or works, but are freely justified for Christ鈥檚 sake, through faith, when they believe that they are received into favor, and that their sins are forgiven for Christ鈥檚 sake, who, by His death, has made satisfaction for our sins. This faith God imputes for righteousness in His sight.鈥�18

The fifth article, 鈥淭he Office of the Ministry,鈥� again reveals the perplexing Lutheran mix of grace and the sacraments. It says: 鈥淭hat we may obtain this faith, the Ministry of Teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments was instituted. For through the Word and Sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Ghost is given, who works faith; where and when it pleases God, in them that hear the Gospel, to wit, that God, not for our own merits, but for Christ鈥檚 sake, justifies those who believe that they are received into grace for Christ鈥檚 sake. They condemn the Anabaptists and others who think that the Holy Ghost comes to men without the external Word, through their own preparations and works.鈥�19

The sixth article 鈥淭he New Obedience鈥� affirms that justifying faith will produce good works. It specifically denies聽that these works secure merit, especially the merit of justification.

The seventh article on 鈥淭he Church鈥� defines the church as 鈥渢he congregation of saints, in which the Gospel is rightly taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered.鈥�20

The eighth article describes 鈥淲hat the Church Is.鈥� This article recognizes that the church is properly the assembly of all believers. It also confesses that many unsaved people are in the churches. This article seemingly admits the necessary lack of regenerate membership in Lutheran churches. We must observe that a regenerate membership cannot exist when unsaved people are made part of the church through the door of infant baptism. The last article statement in the section criticizes the Donatists for their insistence on a regenerate membership. The full section reads:

Although the Church is properly the congregation of saints and true believers, nevertheless, since in this life many hypocrites and evil persons are mingled among the believers, it is allowable to use the sacraments which are administered by evil men, according to the saying of Christ, 鈥淭he Scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses鈥� seat,鈥� etc. [Matt. 23:2]. Both the sacraments and the Word are effective because of the institution and commandment of Christ, even when administered by evil men.

We condemn the Donatists, and all like them, who denied it to be allowable to use the ministry of evil men in聽the Church, and who thought the ministry of evil men to be unprofitable and of no effect.21

The ninth article on 鈥淏aptism鈥� states the Lutheran view on the subject. 鈥淥f Baptism they teach that it is necessary to salvation, and that through Baptism is offered the grace of God, and that children are to be baptized who, being offered to God through Baptism, are received into God鈥檚 grace. They condemn the Anabaptists, who reject the baptism of children, and say that children are saved without Baptism.鈥�22

The tenth article 鈥淭he Holy Supper of the Lord鈥� is brief. It states: 鈥淥f the Supper of the Lord they teach that the Body and Blood of Christ are truly present, and are distributed to those who eat the Supper of the Lord; and they reject those that teach otherwise.鈥�23 This article teaches the 鈥渞eal presence鈥� of Christ鈥檚 body and blood in the sacrament. It also teaches that both bread and wine are to be distributed to the communicants, and it rejects other views.

This sets the stage for the Lutheran position on the ubiquity (omnipresence) of Christ鈥檚 body. The roots of this doctrine are found in the reasoning of William of Occam. Occam proceeded still further, dialectically postulating, at least, the possibility of the 鈥渞epletive existence鈥� (and thus of the ubiquity) of the body of Christ. He accordingly taught, (1) the actual 鈥渞epletive existence鈥� of God; (2) the local presence of the body of Christ in heaven; (3) the non-quantitative, definitive presence in many places of the body of Christ in the host; and the possibility of the ubiquity of this body in the universe.24

Luther rejected the Catholic doctrine that the bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ. Rather, he adopted 鈥渢he teaching of the consubstantiation (of Occam), postulating, without any attempt at explanation, the substantial coexistence of the bread and the body of Christ in the Eucharist.鈥�25

The eleventh article on 鈥淐onfession鈥� retains confession as a practice.

The twelfth article is entitled 鈥淩epentance.鈥� It states:

Of repentance they teach that for those who have fallen after Baptism there is remission of sins whenever they are converted and that the Church ought to impart absolution to those thus returning to repentance. Now, repentance consists properly of these two parts: One is contrition, that is, terrors smiting the conscience through the knowledge of sin; the other is faith, which is born of the Gospel, or of absolution, and believes that for Christ鈥檚 sake, sins are forgiven, comforts the conscience, and delivers it from terrors. Then good works are bound to follow, which are the fruits of repentance. They condemn the Anabaptists, who deny that those once justified can lose the Holy Ghost. Also those who contend that some may attain to such perfection in this life that they cannot sin. The Novatians also are condemned; who would not absolve such as had fallen after Baptism, though they returned to repentance. They also are rejected who do not teach that remission of sins comes through faith but command us to merit grace through satisfactions of our own.26

Note that the statement denies eternal security. The statement affirms that the church in some way offers absolution to the repentant. The statement condemns the聽Anabaptist position on security. The statement likewise rejects the Catholic teaching on meritocracy.

The thirteenth article 鈥淭he Use of the Sacraments鈥� states that the sacraments are a means of awakening faith.

The fourteenth article is on 鈥淥rder in the Church.鈥� It states that only those who are called should teach or administer the sacraments.

The fifteenth article on 鈥淐hurch Usages鈥� deals with ecclesiastical 鈥渉oly days.鈥� The statement affirms that they may be observed, but they are not binding upon believers. This statement again renounces meritocracy.

The sixteenth article discusses 鈥淐ivil Government.鈥� This article affirms that Christians may participate in civil government and hold office. It also affirms that government is ordained of God and should be preserved. It rejects the Anabaptist position of not participating in civil government. Finally, it states that Christians are duty bound to obey civil law. 鈥淭herefore, Christians are necessarily bound to obey their own magistrates and laws save only when commanded to sin; for then they ought to obey God rather than men Acts 5:29.鈥�27

The seventeenth article discusses 鈥淭he Return of Christ to Judgment.鈥� It affirms Lutheran belief that Scripture teaches that Christ will return and that there will be a judgment of the saved and the lost. It goes on to state of Lutheran pastors: 鈥淭hey condemn the Anabaptists, who think that there will be an end to the punishments of condemned men and devils. They condemn also others who are now spreading certain Jewish opinions, that before the resurrection of the dead the godly shall take possession of the kingdom of the world, the ungodly being everywhere suppressed.鈥�28

The eighteenth article is on 鈥淔reedom of the Will.鈥� The opening statement succinctly states: 鈥淥f Free Will they teach that man鈥檚 will has some liberty to choose civil righteousness, and to work things subject to reason. But it has no power, without the Holy Ghost, to work the righteousness of God, that is, spiritual righteousness; since the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, 1 Cor. 2:14; but this righteousness is wrought in the heart when the Holy Ghost is received through the Word.鈥�29

The nineteenth article 鈥淭he Cause of Sin鈥� attributes sin to the perverted will of sinful men.

The twentieth article on 鈥淔aith and Good Works鈥� is extensive. The statement affirms that justification comes only by grace through faith. It reaffirms the Lutheran rejection of good works as a means of gaining merit with God. It teaches that good works naturally follow justification, and they are the will of God for the Christian. The summation crystallizes the statement:

Hence it may be readily seen that this doctrine is not to be charged with prohibiting good works, but rather the more to be commended, because it shows how we are enabled to do good works. For without faith human nature can in no wise do the works of the First or of the Second Commandment. Without faith it does not call upon God, nor expect anything from God, nor bear the cross, but seeks, and trusts in, man鈥檚 help. And thus, when there is no faith and trust in God all manner of lusts and human devices rule in the heart. Wherefore Christ said, John 15:5: Without Me ye can do nothing; and the Church sings:

Lacking Thy divine favor,
There is nothing found in man,
Naught in him is harmless.30

The twenty-first article addresses 鈥淭he Cult of the Saints.鈥� The article positively states that the memory of the saints is to be preserved 鈥渢hat we may follow their faith and good works.鈥� It specifically states that the saints are not to be addressed in prayer. It further states that Christ is the only one to whom believers are to pray. It affirms that Jesus has promised to answer the prayers of believers.

This concludes the section in which the Lutherans articulated their doctrinal beliefs. They closed this section by saying:

This is about the Sum of our Doctrine, in which, as can be seen, there is nothing that varies from the Scriptures, or from the Church Catholic, or from the Church of Rome as known from its writers. This being the case, they judge harshly who insist that our teachers be regarded as heretics. There is, however, disagreement on certain Abuses, which have crept into the Church without rightful authority. And even in these, if there were some difference, there should be proper lenity on the part of bishops to bear with us by reason of the Confession which we have now reviewed; because even the Canons are not so severe as to demand the same rites everywhere, neither, at any time, have the rites of all churches been the same; although, among us, in large part, the ancient rites are diligently observed. For it is a false and malicious charge that all the ceremonies, all the things instituted of old, are abolished in our churches. But it has been a common complaint that some abuses were connected with the ordinary rites. These, inasmuch as they could not be approved with a good conscience, have been to some extent corrected.31

The twenty-second article begins the second major division of the Confession. It deals, as Haara noted, with abuses the Lutherans observed in their controversy with Rome. The twenty-second article addresses the subject 鈥淥f聽Both Kinds in the Sacrament.鈥� As the last article ended with a summary of the first division, this article is prefaced with a preamble-like statement that sets the tone for the last articles. It states:

Inasmuch, then, as our churches dissent in no article of the faith from the Church Catholic, but only omit some abuses which are new, and which have been erroneously accepted by the corruption of the times, contrary to the intent of the Canons, we pray that Your Imperial Majesty would graciously hear both what has been changed, and what were the reasons why the people were not compelled to observe those abuses against their conscience. Nor should Your Imperial Majesty believe those who, in order to excite the hatred of men against our part, disseminate strange slanders among the people. Having thus excited the minds of good men, they have first given occasion to this controversy, and now endeavor, by the same arts, to increase the discord. For Your Imperial Majesty will undoubtedly find that the form of doctrine and of ceremonies with us is not so intolerable as these ungodly and malicious men represent. Besides, the truth cannot be gathered from common rumors or the revilings of enemies. But it can readily be judged that nothing would serve better to maintain the dignity of ceremonies, and to nourish reverence and pious devotion among the people than if the ceremonies were observed rightly in the churches.32

The article then states that the Lutherans gave their sacrament of the Lord鈥檚 Supper to the people in both kinds (both bread and wine). It states that their practice followed the biblical pattern and historic precedent. The argument assumes the real presence of Christ in the elements, calling the wine 鈥渢he blood of Christ.鈥�33

The twenty-third article, 鈥淭he Marriage of Priests,鈥� argues for allowing priests to marry based on Paul鈥檚 statements in 1 Corinthians 7. The article speaks of the scandals among the priests and thus argues for marriage on a practical level as an antidote to immorality.

The twenty-fourth article speaks of 鈥淭he Mass.鈥� The article begins in an interesting manner that also reveals something of the Lutheran view of worship. It states: 鈥淔alsely are our churches accused of abolishing the Mass; for the Mass is retained among us, and celebrated with the highest reverence. Nearly all the usual ceremonies are also preserved, save that the parts sung in Latin are interspersed here and there with German hymns, which have been added to teach the people.鈥�34 The article then goes on to repudiate the Roman abuses of the Mass.

One of the Catholic abuses of the mass related to money. 鈥淏ut it is evident that for a long time this also has been the public and most grievous complaint of all good men that Masses have been basely profaned and applied to purposes of lucre. For it is not unknown how far this abuse obtains in all the churches by what manner of men Masses are said only for fees or stipends, and how many celebrate them contrary to the Canons.鈥�35

Another abuse was the heresy that Christ鈥檚 death made satisfaction for original sin and the Mass makes satisfaction for daily sins. The statement appeals to Hebrews 10 in stating that Christ鈥檚 death was sufficient to make satisfaction for all sins.

The Confession views the Mass as a sacrament, but also as a remembrance of Christ鈥檚 work. It says:

But Christ commands us, Luke 22:19: This do in remembrance of Me; therefore the Mass was instituted that the faith of those who use the Sacrament should remember what benefits it receives through Christ, and cheer and comfort the anxious conscience. For to remember Christ is to remember His benefits, and to realize that they are truly聽offered unto us. Nor is it enough only to remember the history; for this also the Jews and the ungodly can remember. Wherefore the Mass is to be used to this end, that there the Sacrament [Communion] may be administered to them that have need of consolation; as Ambrose says: Because I always sin, I am always bound to take the medicine. [Therefore this Sacrament requires faith, and is used in vain without faith.]36

The twenty-fifth article discusses 鈥淐onfession.鈥� The opening paragraph of the statement reveals again the sacramentalism of this Reformation body.

Confession in the churches is not abolished among us; for it is not usual to give the body of the Lord, except to them that have been previously examined and absolved. And the people are most carefully taught concerning faith in the absolution, about which formerly there was profound silence. Our people are taught that they should highly prize the absolution, as being the voice of God, and pronounced by God鈥檚 command. The power of the Keys is set forth in its beauty and they are reminded what great consolation it brings to anxious consciences, also, that God requires faith to believe such absolution as a voice sounding from heaven, and that such faith in Christ truly obtains and receives the forgiveness of sins. Aforetime satisfactions were immoderately extolled; of faith and the merit of Christ and the righteousness of faith no mention was made; wherefore, on this point, our churches are by no means to be blamed. For this even our adversaries must needs concede to us that the doctrine concerning repentance has been most diligently treated and laid open by our teachers.37

The statement does not require the naming of all known sins to the priest. Lutheranism argues for justification by faith for a permanent sacrifice for sin by Christ and still teaches confession and absolution by the church.

The twenty-sixth article carries the title 鈥淭he Distinction of Foods.鈥� It condemns the meritocracy that fasts produced. It also affirms that these practices go beyond the teachings of Scripture.

The twenty-seventh article deals with 鈥淢onastic Vows.鈥� It condemns the practice for several reasons, including the corruption the monasteries produced, and the commandments that were laid on monks beyond the teachings of Scripture: 鈥淚n Augustine鈥檚 time they were free associations. Afterward, when discipline was corrupted, vows were everywhere added for the purpose of restoring discipline, as in a carefully planned prison.鈥�38

The twenty-eighth article speaks to 鈥淭he Power of the Bishops.鈥� The statement opens by saying: 鈥淭here has been great controversy concerning the Power of Bishops, in which some have awkwardly confounded the power of the Church and the power of the sword.鈥�39 It viewed the legitimate power of the bishops as specifically limited. 鈥淏ut this is their opinion, that the power of the Keys, or the power of the bishops, according to the Gospel, is a power or commandment of God, to preach the Gospel, to remit and retain sins, and to administer Sacraments.鈥� It further stated: 鈥淭his power is exercised only by teaching or preaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments, according to their calling either to many or to individuals.鈥�40 The article called for a form of separation of church and state:

Therefore the power of the Church and the civil power must not be confounded. The power of the Church has its own commission to teach the Gospel and to administer the Sacraments. Let it not break into the office of another; let it not transfer the kingdoms of this world; let it not abrogate the laws of civil rulers; let it not abolish lawful obedience; let it not interfere with judgments concerning civil聽ordinances or contracts; let it not prescribe laws to civil rulers concerning the form of the Commonwealth. As Christ says, John 18:36: My kingdom is not of this world; also Luke 12:14: Who made Me a judge or a divider over you? Paul also says, Phil. 3:20: Our citizenship is in heaven; 2 Cor. 10:4: The weapons of our warfare are not carnal, but mighty through God to the casting down of imaginations. After this manner our teachers discriminate between the duties of both these powers, and command that both be honored and acknowledged as gifts and blessings of God.41

The very next paragraph did seem to allow for a bishop to hold both civil and ecclesiastical office: 鈥淚f bishops have any power of the sword, that power they have, not as bishops, by the commission of the Gospel, but by human law having received it of kings and emperors for the civil administration of what is theirs. This, however, is another office than the ministry of the Gospel.鈥�42

The article also objects to the abuse of bishops creating traditions not taught by Scripture. It concludes by appealing to 1 Peter 5:3 as a proscription of bishops acting as lords over the churches.

Reason in Lutheran Theology

The place of reason in theology must be understood in any theological system. This is a function of Prolegomena in the study of systematic theology. It is an issue of tension in Lutheran theology, and it should have been noticeable by now. E. Brooks Holifield observes that Luther seemed to work in paradoxes. He 鈥渄isparaged natural reason as a foe to faith.鈥�43 This produced certain positions, such as:

鈥淐hrist was fully God and fully human at the same time.鈥�

鈥淏elievers were totally sinful and totally righteous at the same time.鈥�

鈥淭he grounding of the gospel was the paradoxical revelation of God in the suffering and dying of Jesus on the cross.鈥�

鈥淚n Luther鈥檚 theology, the cross was the foundation for the doctrine that the justification of the sinful was a sheer gift of grace to be gratefully accepted in faith, not a reward for spiritual or moral achievement.鈥�

鈥淟uther defended theological positions鈥攕uch as the corporeal presence of Christ鈥檚 body and blood in the sacramental bread and wine, or the doctrine that the baptismal water contained and conveyed a saving spiritual grace鈥攖hat his critics derided as irrational. In turn, he saw his critics as more devoted to Aristotle than to a gospel that was 鈥榝oolishness to the wise.鈥欌��44

The issue of the 鈥渃orporeal presence of Christ鈥檚 body and blood in the sacramental bread and wine鈥� was an issue of debate among Lutheran theologians. They differed on the 鈥渦biquity of Christ鈥檚 body,鈥� a philosophical position which was Luther鈥檚 justification for his view of consubstantiation in the Eucharist.45

Conclusion

It is important to note just how far Lutheranism did not come in its journey out of Rome. Luther was excommunicated on January 3, 1521.46 The Augsburg Confession was written nine years later, in 1530. At that time the Lutherans were still affirming doctrinal unity with Rome聽and seeking to reform what they called 鈥渁buses鈥� in the Catholic Church.
Lutheran sacramentalism is also readily apparent. By now we have seen that Lutheranism ties baptism and regeneration together. We have seen how the system affirms the real presence of Christ in the elements of the Eucharist. We have seen here that they still viewed their liturgical services as a Mass.

The issue of the ubiquity of Christ鈥檚 body is a conundrum. Luther sought to reject the transubstantiation of the Catholic mass and yet maintain the real presence of Christ鈥檚 body in the elements of the Eucharist.

In spite of the sacramentalism in the system, the emphasis on God鈥檚 grace and justification by faith leaps out at the reader of the doctrinal statements. The great issue in presenting the Gospel to Lutherans is the question of trust. Is one trusting the finished work of Christ without any work as the Bible teaches? Or, is a person trusting that the grace of God is somehow communicated through the sacraments? Scripture is clear that we enter into this personal relationship with God apart from any work of our own. Romans 3:28 states: 鈥淭herefore we conclude that a man is justified by faith apart from the deeds of the law.鈥� In the very next chapter the Apostle Paul reinforces this truth with the example of Abraham: 鈥淔or what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace, but of debt. But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness鈥� (Romans 4:3鈥�5). God justifies us by our faith in Christ without any work of our own. Scripture teaches justification by faith alone.

The opposition to works and meritocracy is reflective of that emphasis, and it is also reflective of Luther鈥檚 own conversion experience. The Lutheran position on law and grace is the most biblical of the reformed traditions on this subject.

1 Dr. Fred Moritz is Professor of Systematic Theology at 海角原创 Baptist Seminary.

2 Steven Lawson, 鈥淭he Reformation and the Men Behind It鈥澛�/. Accessed November 8, 2014.

3 鈥淭he Magisterial Reformation,鈥� . Accessed October 26, 2014.

4 鈥淭he Radical Reformation,鈥� . Accessed October 26, 2014.

5 鈥淩adical,鈥� radical. Accessed November 8, 2014.

6 Philip Schaff and David Schley Schaff, History of the Christian Church (New York: Charles Scribner鈥檚 Sons, 1910), 8: 71鈥�72 [emphasis mine]. In referring to the Radical Reformers, 鈥淟uther called them martyrs of the devil; but Leonhard Kaeser, to whom he wrote a letter of comfort, and whom he held up as a model martyr to the heretical martyrs (see Letters, ed. De Wette, III. 179), was not a Lutheran, as he thought, but the pastor of an Anabaptist congregation at Scherding. He was burnt Aug. 18, 1527, by order of the bishop of Passau. See Cornelius, II. 56.鈥�

7 John H. Leith, ed., Creeds of the Churches鈥擜 Reader in Christian Doctrine from the Bible to the Present (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1963), 62.

8 David M. Haara, Pastor of Family of Christ Lutheran Church, Tampa, FL. Interview by author, Tampa, July 3, 2013. I am indeb-ted to Pastor Haara for graciously spending an extended period of time with me.

9 鈥淲hat is a Lutheran?鈥� .

10 Ibid.

11 This entire section is taken from 鈥淭he Lutheran Confessions.鈥� .

12 Leith, 64. The Confession may be found at .

13 Ibid.

14 Haara interview, July 3, 2013.

15 . The titles of the articles are taken from the Confession as found in Leith, 67鈥�107. The translation and titles in the online document are slightly different.

16 Ibid.

17 David Haara interview.

18 .

19 Ibid. Apparently the statement against the Anabaptists refers to the abuses of the Zwickau Prophets.

20 Ibid. This is practically identical to Calvin鈥檚 statement: 鈥淗ence the form of the Church appears and stands forth conspicuous to our view. Wherever we see the word of God sincerely preached and heard, wherever we see the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ, there we cannot have any doubt that the Church of God has some existence, since his promise cannot fail, 鈥榃here two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them鈥� (Mt. 18:20).鈥� John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (Bellingham, WA: Logos Research Systems, Inc., 1997), IV, i, 9.

21 鈥淭he Augsburg Confession,鈥� . Accessed January 1, 2015.

22 Ibid.

23 Ibid.

24 Samuel Macauley Jackson, ed., The New Schaff-Herzogg Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge (Grand Rapids: Baker, 19509reprint, http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/encyc12.i.html. Accessed February 23, 2015.

25 Ibid.

26 . Accessed January 1, 2015.

27 Ibid.

28 Ibid. The last statement apparently opposes Melchoir Hoffman鈥檚 view of eschatology. Hoffman believed that Strasbourg would be the New Jerusalem and that he himself was the Prophet聽Elijah chosen to announce the event. See .

29 Ibid.

30 Ibid.

31 Ibid.

32 Ibid.

33 Ibid.

34 Ibid.

35 Ibid.

36 Ibid.

37 .

38 Ibid.

39 Ibid.

40 Ibid.

41 Ibid.

42 Ibid.

43 E. Brooks Holifield, Theology in America鈥擟hristian Thought from the Age of the Puritans to the Civil War (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003), 398.

44 Ibid.

45 David Haara, interview of July 3, 2013, confirmed that the concept of the ubiquity of Christ鈥檚 body deals with the real presence of Christ鈥檚 body in Communion.

46 .

Before the Third Reich obtained full political power in Germany, there was an effort to unify the Protestant churches, mostly Lutheran, into one church, merged with the ideologies of the Nazi state. Though there was much support from a large portion of Protestants, known as the Deutsche Christen (German Christians), who supported such an effort, there were also those who opposed the effort. The opposition would eventually form what became known as the Bekennende Kirche (Confessing Church). Though they were astute enough to recognize the dangerous propositions being purported by the German Christians and the Nazi regime, their significant misinterpretation regarding Lutheran theological positions and the development of a creed based upon the neo-orthodox positions of Karl Barth left the Confessing Church with little more than a weak protest against the Nazi government and a weak stance on the atrocities the Third Reich committed. An examination of the origination of the Confessing Church, its actions (or lack thereof) throughout the Nazi rise of power, and its demise in the aftermath of World War II will demonstrate that such theological positions hindered the Confessing Church from aggressively opposing de F眉hrer.

The Need for the Confessing Church

As the Nazi party began to rise, so did the German Christian movement. This movement was officially known as Glaubensbewegung Deutsche Christen (the German Christian Faith Movement).2 Though the Nazi party did not desire to back a particular church group initially, there was a growing number of Protestant clergy who felt a strong need for a 鈥渃onservative, Lutheran and above all German form of doctrine, and various church groups were formed throwing their confessional weight behind the Nazi movement.鈥�3 The result was that 鈥渂y June 6, 1932, the German Christian Faith Movement had an organizational structure similar to that of the National Socialist party.鈥�4 Such a hierarchy of structure, found similarly within the Catholic Church and other denominations, no longer seeks to allow Christ to be head of the church, but sinful man. This was the case for the German Christians. Before they began to follow Hitler, they were devoted to the doctrines of Martin Luther. As this movement began to gain momentum, the German Christians desired to incorporate 鈥渢he twenty-seven Protestant regional churches into a united German Evangelical Reich church headed by a Reich bishop with close ties to Hitler.鈥�5 It is clear that this forfeited the autonomy of the local church. Hockenos elaborates on this fact, stating that 鈥渢heir goal to integrate Christianity and National Socialism in a racially pure 鈥榩eople鈥檚 church鈥� was a聽direct challenge not only to the autonomy of the regional churches but to Lutheran and Reformed doctrinal principles as well.鈥�6 The adherence to Lutheran theology gripped the people tightly; and as Hitler became Chancellor, the excitement behind the Nazi movement fanned excitement among the German Christians.

Hitler became Reich Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933. At this time, 鈥渘early all of those pastors who would become members of the Confessing Church anticipated cooperation rather than confrontation with National Socialism.鈥�7 At Hitler鈥檚 rise to Chancellor, 鈥淧rotestant churchmen across the country shared in general enthusiasm for his nationalist, anticommunist and anti-Semitic rhetoric.鈥�8 Soon after Hitler became Chancellor, he appointed Ludwig M眉ller as Reich Bishop of the German Christians and initiated the Reich Civil Service Law of April 1933. Civil servants who were not of Aryan descent, as well as opponents of the Nazi regime, were forced to retire from civil service. This included clergy, as they were financially supported by the state. 9 At this point, there was unrest in those who would form the Confessing Church. Begbie notes that 鈥渃hurch resistance to the Nazis began first and foremost as a church struggle, without any question of political resistance.鈥�10 Such political resistance was unthinkable at this time, since it would be contrary to the Lutheran two-kingdom doctrine!

The German Christian influence reached into the Old Prussian and Land Churches. These areas were where 鈥渢he聽administration and governing authorities of the Land Churches came largely under control of German Christians, who accepted the policies of the National Church Administration headed by Bishop M蠇ller.鈥�11 Jantzen notes that 鈥渄espite these significant differences in their ecclesiastical contexts, however, all three districts endured significant levels of church-political conflict鈥攏ot least in the form of strife between fellow clergymen.鈥�12

The Beginning of the Confessing Church Protestant clergymen, who were disturbed by the Nazi regime鈥檚 ecclesiastical policies, had joined Martin Niem枚ller鈥檚 Pastor鈥檚 Emergency League.13 On 29 May 1934, 138 church delegates attended a synod at Barmen and pledged supported a new 鈥淐onfessing Church鈥� (Bekenntniskirche). This was a significant move towards consolidated resistance against the influence of the German Christians.14 Their main concern with the Nazi influence was the perpetration of its beliefs within the German Christian churches. The German Christians openly accepted the Nazi鈥檚 鈥渉ighly politicized and secularized theology that subverted scripture and the inherited Lutheran and Reformed confessions with F蠇hrer-worship, German v枚lkischness, and explicitly racial anti-Semitism.鈥�15 Baranowski states that those that represented the Confessing Church 鈥渟ought to preserve the purity of the gospel as stated in the Old and New Testaments and again brought to light in the historic Lutheran and Reformed聽Confessional statements.鈥�16 This was accomplished primarily through Karl Barth and the Barmen Declaration.

The Barman Declaration affirmed the Confessing Church鈥檚 loyalty to Christ and set forth the limits of secular government.17 Barth took this opportunity to insert much of his neo-orthodox positions, including the rejection of natural (general) theology. Ballor notes that 鈥渢he relation of the Barmen Declaration to the Confessing Church and the relation of the Confessing Church to the broader ecumenical world both revolved around Barth鈥檚 鈥楴o!鈥� to natural theology.鈥�18 This Declaration, although not ideal for all clergy involved in the formation of the Confessing Church, sought the preeminence of Christ.

The key-note of the confession was the unique Lordship of Christ over every area of life together with the rejection of any other ultimate authority in faith and conduct. The Confessing Church now regarded herself as the one true Evangelical Church in Germany, although de facto there were two churches: the Confessing Church and the German Evangelical Church under M蠇ller.19

Though the Reformed, United and Lutheran churches came to a shaky agreement to the Barman Declaration, many Lutherans opposed Barth鈥檚 theology because it 鈥渃hallenged four of the conservative Lutheran鈥檚 most sacred tenets: the law-gospel dialectic, the orders of creation or divine orders, natural revelation, and the orthodox Lutheran understanding of Martin Luther鈥檚 doctrine of the two kingdoms.鈥�20 Although they began moving in the right direction by separating from the Third Reich, the Lutheran ideology of church and state both appointed by God kept聽them from being 鈥渦nable to conceive seriously of becoming a 鈥榝ree鈥� church, that is, one dependent entirely on the contribution of a voluntary membership.鈥�21

Those in the Confessing Church were not only facing outside opposition, but there were also internal conflicts between the radical and conservative wings of the Confessing Church. Hockenos notes that 鈥渟ome pastors and church leaders in the Niem枚ller wing of the Confessing Church believed that it was necessary to publically protest state laws and decrees that interfered with the church鈥檚 control over its administrative, financial, legal, and pastoral offices.鈥�22 Indeed, Karl Barth鈥檚 position had many opponents. Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth disagreed on the Jewish question and the Aryan clause.23 Barth saw the need to be separate from the state, but 鈥渕any of the leaders of Confessing Church (especially bishops such as Hans Meiser, Theophil Wurm, and August Marahrens) wanted to be recognized by the state and thereby maintain contact with the rest of the Protestant Church.鈥�24 This continual desire to be tied to the government was rooted in their Lutheran theology.

The influence of Lutheran theology was significantly strong within Germany and their ideology and theology contributed towards many of the actions (or inactions) of both groups. Begbie notes that 鈥渢heologians and clergy in the Lutheran tradition had thus long been schooled to preach obedience to the ruling authorities, basing their arguments on traditional interpretations of Romans 13 and 1 Peter 3:17.鈥�25 Also, it must be noted that the Confessing Church was never completely cut off from state funds. Helmreich states that 鈥渋n general, the Confessing church pastors and congregations continued to be financed through the聽customary church taxes, church money (Kirchgeld), income from lands, state subsidies, and church collections.鈥�26 Barth recognized this, as 鈥渉e held that the failure of the Confessing Church to offer a 鈥榤ore comprehensive resistance鈥� to the political evil of National Socialism was rooted deeply in traditional Lutheran theology.鈥�27

Although the Confessing Church was rooted deeply in Lutheran theology, their association with Barth鈥檚 neo-orthodoxy did not aid in their efforts. Ultimately, the Confessing Church was unable to effectively stand against the rise of Nazism. Begbie notes this by stating that 鈥渁n enormously significant factor was that the churches were theologically ill-equipped and unprepared to come to grips with the immense power of Nazi ideology and the profound issues it raised for the life and witness of the church.鈥�28 Wall concurs by stating that the Church鈥檚 鈥渃ommitment to the fatherland and sense of loyalty to the German people were at least as strong as its moral indignation against National Socialism.鈥�29 This commitment no doubt derived from the influence of Lutheran theology. However, the anti-semitism which also derived from Lutheran theology was far more disastrous.

Silence of the Confessing Church

On August 2, 1934, the German President Hindenburg died. The previous day, the cabinet had enacted the 鈥淟aw Concerning the Highest State Office of the Reich.鈥� This law abolished the office of the President, merging the position鈥檚 powers with those of the Chancellor. Thus, Hitler was now the head of state as well as of the government in a newly titled position, F蠇hrer of Germany. 鈥淭his action gave Hitler ultimate power over Germany, which gave Bishop M蠇ller聽further motivation towards his goal of 鈥榦ne God, one Volk and one Church.鈥欌��30 The aggression by the Nazi regime intensified. Begbie notes that 鈥減olice were harassing pastors not only in the Prussian Confessing Churches but also in other Land Churches. Many were denied the right to preach, their houses were searched, some were dismissed or pensioned, some 700 were arrested, and some placed in concentration camps.鈥�31 Martin Niem枚ller, one of the Confessing Church founders, was imprisoned on 1 July, 1937. The Church was also being influenced from within as well. Members of the Lutheran Council were moderates within the Confessing Church. Although they considered themselves a part of the Confessing Church, they were winning others to their Lutheran positions.

Using the two kingdoms doctrine, these moderates could, on the one hand, celebrate the German revolution and the national awakening, and also accept anti-Jewish laws, while they could work, on the other hand, inside the church against the Aryan paragraph. The political sphere was given independence. It was thus impossible to criticize the political order. Thus both conservative and liberal moderates could affirm the Nazi policy.32

Niem枚ller鈥檚 imprisonment, along with the moderates鈥� determination to accommodate the Nazi regime, caused many within the Church to become increasingly cautious.33 However, actions by the Nazi regime such as 鈥渢he arrest of pastors and church members who acted on their own religious convictions were not viewed in a political framework聽by which Christians could have connected these arrests to the growing oppression of Jews and others under Nazism.鈥�34

These violent acts increased through the months, and before 鈥渢he Munich Agreement in September 1938, when war seemed imminent, three members of the provisional administration, Martin Albertz, Hans B枚hm, and Fritz M蠇ller, wrote and circulated a prayer service of confession and intercession.鈥�35 Within this prayer, there was an omission of prayers for Hitler, Sudeten Germans and a German victory. 鈥淚ncluded were a confession of specific sins of the German people and prayers for all peoples of the world and for peace.鈥�36 The prayer was circulated in the SS newspaper, Das Schwarze Korps, where they received public criticism and disassociation.37 Those in the Confessing Church were branded as traitors to their country and were continually drawing the Gestapo鈥檚 attention. Though the church鈥檚 desire in their minds was to be biblical, they were drawing political lines. Such actions were of little effect to turn the tide. 鈥淎s war loomed and Nazi propaganda stirred national loyalties and revived the anger at Germany鈥檚 defeat in 1918, patriotism stirred in the churches as well as in the general population.鈥�38

Even though the Confessing Church rejected the German War Crusade, they could not publicly denounce Hitler鈥檚 aggressive attacks as unjust.39 This was due to their theological position, as Barnett states: 鈥淩eaching back for the certainties of Lutheran tradition, church leaders felt聽bound by their loyalties to throne and altar.鈥�40 Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German theologian who was opposed to war, 鈥渨as explicit that the Confessing Church should not yield on any point to the Nazi state or those elements in the official church that cooperated with the state.鈥�41 Though there were some such as Bonhoeffer that opposed the Nazi regime, the Church as a whole was silent on Germany鈥檚 encroachment toward war. Wall states that 鈥渢here was no response at all to Hitler鈥檚 dismemberment of Czechoslovakia in March, 1939, or to the Polish crisis in the summer of that year.鈥�42 Hockenos identifies this sin of omission by the Confessing Church:

Although a unified response from the Confessing Church was virtually impossible, the real stumbling block to an official Confessing Church protest was not the confessional, organizational, or even political divisions but the traditional antipathy toward Judaism derived from centuries of Lutheran teaching that the Jew was a godless outcast who would always be a danger to a Christian nation unless he converted to Christianity.43

This distain for the Jewish people, plagued by centuries of Lutheran theology, not only supported a criminal government, but also stood silent as Jews were being eradicated. Begbie concurs, stating that 鈥渢he traditional quietist attitude of Lutheranism towards the state had a large part to play, together with a significant anti-Semitic strain within contemporary Lutheran theology.鈥�44

As the war progressed, some within the Confessing Church 鈥渃ame to the realization that the evil of National Socialism demanded something beyond the strictly ecclesiastical opposition prescribed by Lutheran theology and loyalty to the fatherland.鈥�45 However, by this time, it was too late for any action to be effective against the Nazi war machine. Though Confessing Church members would defend Hebrew Christians against such Nazi policies, it was not for humanitarian reasons they did so, but for theological reasons; they only saw a Jewish Christian as a brother or sister in Christ, rather than a person made in the image of God. The success of Hitler鈥檚 anti-Semitic propaganda can be credited to 鈥渢he unrelenting anti-Jewish Christian theological discourse that linked Nazi propaganda with the traditions and moral authority of the churches.鈥�46

It is important to note that there were many bold individuals fighting against the Nazi government. Though the greatest significance of the Confessing Church was their opposition to the German Christians and the Nazi regime, they could never oppose Nazi doctrine because of the theological chains of Lutheranism that bound them.

The Confessing Church, by its own admission, fell short of fulfilling the mission of the church. It acknowledged that the Third Reich was an immoral state in which evil was not simply an accident but a principle. Yet the theology of the church called for implicit obedience to the duly constituted authorities and discouraged political resistance.47

Conclusion

Though the Confessing Church recognized the dangers and atrocities of the Third Reich, their theological bond to Lutheranism disallowed them from questioning the government. Their hatred towards Jews kept them silent during the darkest hour in German history. Instead of abandoning their Lutheran doctrine, they incorporated Barth鈥檚 neo-orthodox theology into their Lutheranism as their foundation during this trying time. Such a misin-terpretation of the history of biblical theology reveals the dangers of adding any other authority to the Word of God, whether that be an unfounded doctrine, a biased creed, or a faulty theology.

1 Matthew Spurlock is a student at 海角原创 Baptist Seminary. 海角原创 Baptist Theological Journal usually publishes one article each year written by a seminary student.

2 Ernst Christian Helmreich, The German Churches under Hitler: Background, Struggle, and Epilogue (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1979), 127.

3 Jeremy Begbie, 鈥淭he Confessing Church and the Nazis: A Struggle for Theological Truth,鈥� Anvil, A Journal of Theology and Mission 2.2 (Summer 1985): 117鈥�118.

4 Helmreich, 127.

5 Matthew D. Hockenos, A Church Divided: German Protestants Confront the Nazi Past (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2001), 15.

6 Ibid.

7 Donald D. Wall, 鈥淭he Confessing Church and the Second World War,鈥� Journal of Church and State (Winter 1981): 15.

8 Hockenos, 17.

9 Jordan J. Ballor, 鈥淭he Aryan Clause, the Confessing Church, and the Ecumenical Movement: Barth and Bonhoeffer on Natural Theology, 1933鈥�1935,鈥� Scottish Journal of Theology 59.3 (August 2006): 267.

10 Begbie, 118.

11 Helmreich, 413.

12 Kyle Jantzen, 鈥淧ropoganda, Perserverance, and Protest: Strategies for Clerical Survival Amid the German Church Struggle,鈥� Church History: Studies in Christianity and Culture 70.2 (June 2001): 297.

13 Wall, 16.

14 Begbie, 119.

15 Shelley Baranowski, 鈥淐onsent and Dissent: The Confessing Church and Conservative Opposition to National Socialism,鈥� The Journal of Modern History 59.1 (March 1987): 58.

16 Helmreich, 420.

17 Wall, 16.

18 Ballor, 276.

19 Begbie, 119.

20 Hockenos, 23.

21 Baronowski, 65.

22 Hockenos, 17.

23 Ballor, 270.

24 Ballor, 380.

25 Begbie, 125.

26 Helmreich, 416.

27 Wall, 18.

28 Begbie, 123.

29 Wall, 33.

30 Begbie, 119.

31 Ibid, 120.

32 Arne Rasmusson, 鈥溾�楧eprive Them of Their Pathos鈥�: Karl Barth and the Nazi Revolution Revisited,鈥� Modern Theology 23.3 (July 2007): 373.

33 Wall, 17.

34 Victoria Barnett, For The Soul of the People: Prostestant Protest Against Hitler (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), 60.

35 Wall, 19.

36 Ibid.

37 Ibid.

38 Barnett, 92.

39 Wall, 21.

40 Barnett, 37.

41 Ibid, 96.

42 Donald D. Wall, 鈥淭he Confessing Church and Hitler鈥檚 Foreign Policy: The Czechoslovakian Crisis of 1938,鈥� Journal of the American Academy of Religion 44.3 (September 1976): 436.

43 Hockenos, 36.

44 Begbie, 128.

45 Wall, 鈥淭he Confessing Church and the Second World War,鈥� 29.

46 Susannah Heschel, The Aryan Jesus: Christian Theologians and The Bible In Nazi Germany (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008), 7.

47 Wall, 鈥淭he Confessing Church and the Second World War,鈥� 33.

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In the last issue of the 海角原创 Baptist Theological Journal I wrote an article on the Theology of Fellowship. This current article is the flipside of the earlier article. A theology of separation needs to be part of a theology of fellowship. This article will be limited to the New Testament. A study of separation in the Old Testament would be a rich study, for God makes it clear that his holiness requires separation. God removed Adam and Eve from the Garden of Eden. God removed Noah in an ark, separated from the doomed world. He told Abram to leave his family and country. He instructed the nation of Israel to eliminate all Gentiles in the Promised Land so that the Jews would not be contaminated by the wickedness of those living at that time in what would become their new world. When they chose idolatry over their Lord, God placed them in a foreign land where they were not only required to be a part of a pagan culture, but they were also under the thumb of those pagans, until they were ready to return to their land.

The New Testament also lays out requirements for separation. This article will look at passages that demand separation from unbelievers and from believers alike and seek to apply the New Testament teaching to the current situation. Separation in the church age was evidenced in numerous situations. The Donatist controversy in the early church resulted in the separation of a sizable number of African churches from the proto-Roman Catholic Church. The Anabaptists prior to and during the Reformation practiced both church and personal separation. The Reformers separated from the Church at Rome and from each other. Puritans, unable to purify the Church of England, separated and formed their own Separatist churches. Roger Williams, seeking a pure church in Massachusetts, found himself required to separate from those who failed to obey God鈥檚 Word. This article will focus its attention on ecclesiastical separation, the separation of the church as a body, rather than personal separation, which is the separation of an individual from a particular body or the decision of an individual to refrain from participation in a particular practice.

Separation from Unbelievers

The requirement of separation from unsaved individuals is generally accepted by Bible believers. A century ago those who took the name Fundamentalist to demonstrate that they believed that there were certain 鈥渇undamentals鈥� of the faith that could not be given up without also giving up biblical Christianity stood against the liberals in the mainline denominations in America. They initially sought to remove the Bible deniers from the denominations and return them to a purer state. Having failed in that, they left the denominations and created conventions, associa卢tions, and fellowships that were home to those who accepted the truths of Scripture. Others gave up on such connections and began independent churches that stood alone. Separation became a watchword for these people. Even when the evangelicals separated from the fundamentalists about a half century ago, the evangelicals practiced a measure of separation. No denomination that was part of the liberal National Council of Churches could join the evangelical National Association of Evangelicals. One of the early leaders of this new evangelicalism, John Ockenga, argued against the separatism of the Fundamentalists. Nevertheless, he separated from the ecumenically oriented United Church of Christ (after the merger of 1957鈥�61) and helped organize the Conservative Congregational Christian Churches.²

Separation from unbelievers is clearly taught in 2 Corinthians 6:14-7:2.

It is common for Christians to apply Paul鈥檚 instruction here to marriages and close business associations between believers and unbelievers. Paul taught against marrying outside the faith, and wisdom should be exercised in all business relationships. Yet, in this passage Paul focused on all associations with unbelievers that led to infidelity to Christ, particularly by involvement with pagan rituals and idol worship. Paul wanted the Corinthian believers to separate themselves from these practices.³

Paul instructed the Corinthians not to be heterozugeo (鈥渦nequally yoked鈥� which is literally, 鈥渉arnessed to another of a different kind鈥�). This may be a reference to Deuteronomy 22:10, where the Jews were commanded not to plow with both an ox and a donkey or to Leviticus 19:19 where the same Greek word is used in the Septuagint (the Greek translation of the Hebrew Old Testament) to prohibit the mating of different kinds of livestock. Elsewhere Paul spoke of a true yokefellow (suzugos, someone who shares the same yoke) as a person who has joined Paul in his ministry (Phil 4:3). 鈥淭hose who harness themselves together with unbelievers will soon find themselves plowing Satan鈥檚 fields. One can only be a true yokefellow (Phil 4:3) with a fellow Christian.鈥�⁴ In 1 Corinthians 5, Paul realized that eliminating all contact with the world is an impossibility (1 Cor 5:10). The 鈥渦nequal yoke,鈥� therefore, does not refer to casual contacts with the lost. It has to do with serving together in church and ministry activities. The warning is against compromising the integrity of one鈥檚 faith. The idea of the 鈥渦nequal yoke鈥� implies a relationship which will do damage to the Christian鈥檚 testimony.

The Corinthians were not to be yoked with unbelievers, those who do not accept the truth of Scripture. The 峒勏�喂蟽蟿慰蟼 (鈥渦nbeliever鈥�) is Paul鈥檚 opposer, whether saved or lost, although the context would focus this primarily on the unregenerate (see 1 Cor 6:6; 7:12, 13, 14 (2x), 15; 10:27; 14:22 (2x), 23, 24; 2 Cor 4:4). Paul argued against fellowship and in favor of separation from the lost by using a string of similar questions to emphasize the importance of separation.

Paul鈥檚 first question is, What fellowship does righteousness have with unrighteous卢ness? Fellowship here is metoche, a 鈥渏oining together.鈥� The two elements to be kept apart are righteousness and unrighteousness. 鈥淭he Corinthian Christians were sur卢rounded by pagan values and practices. Just because they have been sealed by the Spirit does not mean that they can be careless about their relationships and associations with the world.鈥�⁵ The unrighteousness that Paul speaks of is actually 鈥渓awless卢ness,鈥� the absence of law or lawful works. Righteous activity cannot join together with unlawful activity.

One reason righteousness and unrighteousness cannot be joined is that there is a difference in how believers and unbelievers think (v 14). What communion does light have with dark卢ness? 鈥淐ommunion鈥� in this verse is 魏慰喂谓蠅谓委伪 鈥� doctrinal agreement and a resultant partnership in ministry. Believers are called out of darkness when they are saved; they should not go back into darkness in order to participate in some kind of ministry.

There is a difference concerning whom believers serve (v 15). What concord does Christ have with Belial? Christ is the head of the forces of righteousness. Belial (a name for Satan) is the head of the forces of evil. 鈥淐oncord鈥� is the word sumphonesis, from which comes the English 鈥渟ymphony.鈥�⁶ Paul is writing to those for whom Christ had died. He has emphasized that God had reconciled the world to himself. He spoke of the hardships he had suffered to further the gospel (see 2 Cor 5:14鈥�15, 20; 6:3鈥�10). 鈥淣ow he wanted them to choose for Christ and follow him but to reject Belial and everything that he represents. In parallel terms, the Corinthians must choose faith instead of unbelief, the Christian life instead of worldly ways.鈥�⁷

There is also a difference in how believers approach God (v 15). What part does the believer have with the unbeliever? 渭蔚蟻委蟼 refers to receiving part of the gain of an operation or business venture. Here Paul emphasizes the distinction between the believer (pistos) and the unbeliever (apistos). The unbeliever is someone who does not accept the faith. When Paul began this section, he used 鈥渦nbelievers.鈥� Now he uses the singular, moving from a general statement to a more specific personal application.

There is a difference in the worship of believers and unbelievers (v 16). This is the final question that Paul asks and is the only question that focuses on a specific area of separation. What agreement does the temple of God have with idols? Sugkatathesis (鈥渁greement鈥�), used only here in the New Testament, 鈥渞efers to some kind of consensual affiliation, such as a pact joining persons together in common cause.鈥�⁸ It is used for an approval 鈥渂y putting together the votes.鈥�⁹ Paul had already defined the 鈥渢emple of God鈥� as the church in 1 Corinthians 3:16-17. Plural pronouns are used here, similar to 1 Corinthians 3:16-17. 1 Corinthians 6:19-20 refers to the individual believer as the temple of the Holy Spirit. Here in 2 Corinthians Paul is drawing a comparison between the church and the pagan temples where the gentile Corinthians practiced their idolatry. Idolatry in Corinth was especially wicked. There is no room for idolatry among the church membership because Christians are the temple of God.

Paul concludes this passage with an argument for the practice of separation (v 17a) with quotations from Exodus 25:8, Exodus 29:45 and Leviticus 26:12. Here Paul begins a string of quotations from the Old Testament. The conclusion is for believers to come out from their presence. The tense indicates Paul wanted them to do it now. Failure to separate in moral holiness causes believers to cease being a valid temple of God.

The purpose of separation is seen in vv 17b鈥�18. God will receive or welcome believers into his company; this is the idea of the temple again. God will be a father to the righteous and the righteous will be children to him.

The conclusion is clear. Believers who seek to be obedient to Scripture are to have no fellowship (no spiritual partnering or associating in worship or service) with unbelievers.

Separation from Believers

Separation from unbelievers is not the only instruction given concerning fellowship and separation. There are also instructions given to separate from believers who engage in specific kinds of actions. In fact, there is more specific instruction concerning separation from believers than from unbelievers.

Separation from Those who Sin Blatantly

Paul gives instructions in 1 Corinthians 5:1鈥�5 that the church is to separate from an immoral church member who is obviously unrepentant. From the language Paul uses, speaking of the wife of the individual鈥檚 father, rather than simply referring to her as the individual鈥檚 mother, it appears that the church member was having an immoral relationship with his step-mother. The sin was known to the church. Paul accused the church of pride (they were apparently congratulating themselves on their tolerance of diverse life鈥搒tyles), a lack of mourning (which would indicate a tolerance of gross sin, a sin which even the Romans would not commit), and a failure to do anything about the sin. There are, therefore, two problems in this section: the sin of one individual and the sin of the congregation as a whole.

Paul commanded the church to remove the sinning brother from the membership of the church. The individual Paul was referring to is obviously a member of the church, and Paul apparently assumed that he was a believer. There are numerous interpretations concerning being 鈥渄elivered to Satan鈥� and the 鈥渄estruction of the flesh,鈥� but for the sake of this article, none of them makes a difference. The key point to take away from this part of 1 Cor 5 is that the church has an obligation to separate itself from unrepentant sinners whose sins damage the testimony and character of the church.

In the section following this discussion (1 Cor 5:6ff), Paul does not advocate this same kind of separation from unsaved fornicators and a whole list of other kinds of sinners. One implication of Paul鈥檚 addition of this section is that here is a list of sinful activities which are cause for church discipline, not just living with one鈥檚 stepmother. A second implication is that biblical fellowship and separation does not refer to friendships and interactions with unsaved neighbors, co-workers, family, and friends. Otherwise, Paul could not advocate separation in the first half of this chapter and association with the same kind of people in the last half. Paul clearly describes the biblical doctrine of fellowship; believers cannot be spiritual partners in ministry with someone who lives in willful sin and rebellion against God鈥檚 teachings. Similarly, believers can associate with unbelievers who practice these same sins, but they cannot fellowship with them.

2 Thessalonians 3:6-15
In 2 Thessalonians 3:6, Paul commanded his readers in a forceful way to separate. This was not a simple suggestion. This was a command made 鈥渋n the name of our Lord Jesus Christ鈥� to stay away or separate from a brother who is walking disorderly. Paul is clearly speaking of a saved person.

The problem with this brother is not doctrinal. He is walking ataktos (鈥渄isorderly鈥�). This refers to walking 鈥�in defiance of good order, disorderly . . . apparently without respect for established custom or received instruction.鈥�¹⁰ This would mean a lifestyle that does not match up with the requirements of Scripture. Paul repeats this word in verse 11. Paul focuses on the problem of not working to support oneself. 鈥淎lthough the context of the idle is definitely in mind, this encouragement and the instructions that follow (vv. 14鈥�15) could apply to a multitude of situations in the early church and today. What could be more Christ-like than persisting in well-doing even when the beneficiaries of love in action do not deserve or appreciate the sacrifice made on their behalf?鈥�¹¹

The believer鈥檚 first requirement in verse 14 is 蟽畏渭蔚喂蠈蠅, 鈥渢o take special notice of, mark.鈥�¹² The church is to publicly identify the man who refuses to obey God鈥檚 Word. Second, the church is not to sunanamignumi, to 鈥�mingle, associate with.鈥�¹³ The fellowship of the church is to be removed from such a person. In verse 15, the church is not to regard him as an enemy, for he is a brother in Christ. Nevertheless, the church is to noutheteo, 鈥渢o counsel about avoidance or cessation of an improper course of conduct, admonish, warn, instruct.鈥�¹⁴ The church is to warn this type of person concerning his error. The use of plural verbs and the plural 鈥渂rothers鈥� indicates that this is a corporate instruction, not a commandment given to an individual Christian. This instruction is predicated on the biblical concept of fellowship and separation; the church cannot partner with this kind of person in activities that are founded on the Spirit and seek to result in spiritual benefits.

Separation from Those who Advocate Divisive Doctrine

There are several passages of Scripture which instruct New Testament believers to separate from those who teach and promote false doctrine. This article will look only at two of these passages.

Romans 16:17-18
In Romans 16:17-18, Paul instructed the church in Rome to skopeo (鈥渕ark鈥�) and ekklino (鈥渁void鈥�) those who advocated divisive doctrine. 鈥淢ark鈥� means 鈥渢o pay careful attention to, look (out) for, notice.鈥�¹⁵ Paul uses the word in Phil 3:17 to instruct the Philippians to mark those who were following him and imitate them. The term is used here to instruct the Romans to look out for those who cause divisions for the purpose of avoiding them. 鈥淎void鈥� means 鈥渢o keep away from, steer clear of.鈥�¹⁶

Paul teaches that church members are to 鈥渕ark鈥� and 鈥渁void鈥� those who create dichostasia 鈥渄ivisions鈥� or 鈥渄issen卢sions鈥� and skandalon 鈥渟tumblingblocks鈥� by means of wrong doctrine. Dissension is listed as one of the works of the flesh in Gal 5:20. 鈥淭here is an article with divisions (and another with obstacles); it is 鈥榯he well-known divisions鈥� and not some hypothetical danger of which Paul warns.鈥�¹⁷ These individuals were teaching lies to those who had learned the truth. Paul had not yet been to Rome, but the Romans were well aware of the truth. 鈥淭hus a departure from the Pauline teaching is a departure from the very tradition vouchsafed to the Romans when they believed. Paul did not believe that he was introducing novel doctrines to the Roman community.鈥�¹⁸

There is nothing in the text that clearly declares whether these false teachers were saved or lost. Either way, they were creating factions and strife in the church. Instead of serving the Lord, they taught false doctrine for the sake of their own good. If these individuals were not part of the church at Rome, they were at least individuals known to the church; in that time it would have been difficult for non-Christians to advocate divisive doctrine among the church members. Everyone would have understood that the Roman pagans were not believers and their teachings unbiblical. The false teachers could have been Jewish unbelievers, but there was enough tension between the Jewish community and the church to keep unsaved Jews from teaching in the church. If these false teachers were Judaizers, it would appear that since Paul confronted them in the context of the church at Jerusalem, that the Judaizers at the very least claimed to be believers. Since Paul did not identify who these teachers were, it is best to focus attention on the teaching that the church is to defend itself against false teachers, saved or lost.

1 Timothy 6:3-5
Three times in Paul鈥檚 first letter to Timothy he addressed false teachers. In 1 Tim 1:3 he instructed Timothy to com卢mand unnamed individuals to stop teaching false doctrines, particularly regarding myths and genealogies. Paul has apparently created a new verb, heterodidaskalein, literally 鈥渢o teach a doctrine of a different kind.鈥�¹⁹ This word comes into the English as 鈥渉eterodoxy.鈥� In 6:3 Paul defines 鈥渉eterodoxy鈥� as that which is contrary to 鈥渟ound words鈥� (which came from Jesus Christ) and contrary to the doctrine which conforms to godliness. 鈥淭he standard for truth was the Old Testament, the words of Christ, and the teaching of the apostles. All else was wrong, false, untrue.鈥� ²⁰

Who were these false teachers? In 1:3 Paul used the indefinite pronoun 鈥渃ertain ones.鈥� In 1:19 Paul again referred to 鈥渃ertain ones.鈥� In v 20, however, he named two of the false teachers鈥擧ymenaeus and Alexander. These two men appear then to be the worst representatives or the ring-leaders of this group of false teachers.²¹ While Paul was not afraid to identify specific individuals in some contexts, in other places he hid identi卢ties. The implication is that in some specific cases it is appropriate to identify false teachers, while in other cases it is best to hide the identities. It would seem to be appropriate to identify leaders of the false teachers; it also seems to be appropriate to identify those who affect the local church the most. It also appears that where there is hope to correct the false teacher, his identity is kept hidden.

What were these men teaching? The first-century myths were not merely fairy tales; they were legends and stories used to promote immoral lifestyles. These stories were used as justification for behavior which was contrary to righteousness. Because these were apparently being accepted in the church at Ephesus, the teachers may have been using Old Testament stories, along with allegories developed out of those stories. The false teachers had 鈥減roof texts鈥� for their own ideas, biases, and desires.²² The reference to endless genealogies 鈥渞efers to histories and prophetic speculations rising out of guesswork and the desire to be different. Such people became the special interpreters of Scripture; they claimed special knowledge.鈥�²³ Paul rejected these false teachers and their stories because they promoted controversies within the church rather than God鈥檚 work.

The teaching of these false teachers produces envy, disagreement, defamation, conjectures, and continuous arguing, everything that should not take place in a church. The faithful Christian is to withdraw from such a person.²⁴ The word is aphistemi which means 鈥渢o distance oneself from some pers. or thing.鈥�²⁵

Titus 3:10, 11
Paul did not treat unbelievers and believers in the same way. Unbelievers are ignorant of who God is; they do not know his goodness, power, or holiness. Christians, on the other hand 鈥渒now God鈥檚 goodness, have experienced his grace and love, and are indwelt by his Holy Spirit. Paul recognized that arguing with false teachers pulled a person into their convoluted dialogues, accomplishing nothing. Therefore, he told Titus: Warn a divisive person once, and then warn him a second time.鈥�²⁶ Paul sought to offer an opportunity for the 伪峒毕佄迪勎刮合屜� (鈥渉eretic鈥� or divisive person) to repent. The goal of the warning is the repentance of the divisive person. If, however, he does not repent, then the church is to have nothing more to do with him.

Here is a warning for everyone. Those who dabble in false ideas and theological oddities or those who sin and refuse to come to terms with their disobedience follow a dangerous path that leads to self-deception. It happens slowly as a person permits himself self-apportioned leniency, ignoring the warning signs, the rebukes, the sinful habits that engulf him. Through negligence and unbelief, these Christians become self-condemned. By willfully rejecting the truth, they pronounce judgment on themselves.²⁷

There are several other similar passages. The reader is directed to Galatians 1:8, 9; 2 Timothy 3:5; 1 John 4:1-6; 2 John 7-11; and Revelation 2:14.

Conclusion

Ecclesiastical separation is the flipside of fellowship. A refusal to fellowship (in the sense of theological agreement and ministry which flows out of that agreement) reflects the lifestyle, positions, and values of a church and its members. Separation of a church as a body from individuals who are lost, who teach and advocate false doctrine, or who refuse to obey Paul鈥檚 teaching is clearly taught. It is a logical conclusion (and this author acknowledges that is logical, not a clearly declared conclusion) that if a church is to separate from one individual who practices one of these sins, then it should separate from a body鈥攃hurch, association, or denomination鈥攖hat practices or advocates such belief or action.

Separation from churches or denominations which do not hold to orthodox theology is biblical. Luther separated from Rome. Calvin departed from Rome: 鈥淚t is sufficient for me that it was necessary for us to withdraw from them, in order to approach to Christ.鈥�²⁸ J. Gresham Machen withdrew from the liberal Presbyterian church. Baptists abandoned the Northern Baptist Convention. This kind of separation does not violate the unity of the church, but instead preserves it.

The basis of church unity is doctrine. Unity presupposes a membership with one another in agreement on the basics of Scripture. 鈥淭he faith that avoids theological argument on behalf of Christianity鈥檚 distinctive doctrines is not the faith of the New Testament.鈥� ²⁹

Bible believers should study Roman Catholic theology for several reasons. Numerically, Rome claims a significant Catholic population. The Pontifical Yearbook states that Catholicism claimed 1 billion, 214 million communicants around the world in 2013.² In 2010 there were 63.4 million Catholics in the United States.³

Theologically, Rome claims to be the true church, deriving her authority in a direct line from Christ and the apostles. The Pope makes his pronouncements based on his apostolic authority. In the Apostolic Constitution of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Pope John Paul II stated: 鈥淭he Catechism of the Catholic Church, which I approved 25 June last and the publication of which I today order by virtue of my Apostolic Authority, is a statement of the Church鈥檚 faith and of catholic doctrine, attested to or illumined by Sacred Scripture, the Apostolic Tradition and the Church鈥檚 Magisterium. I declare it to be a sure norm for teaching the faith and thus a valid and legitimate instrument for ecclesial communion.鈥�⁴

It stands to reason that we must be familiar with the teachings of the Catholic Church as we minister to people who have embraced that teaching to one degree or another. We willingly assume several responsi卢bilities as we undertake this evaluation.

We will study aspects of Catholic theology with which we strenuously disagree. We must be objective, biblical, com卢pas卢sionate, and non-pejorative as we seek to connect with Roman Catholics. Major differences exist between those who embrace the position of sola scriptura and those who do not. We must be objective and true to Scripture, and we must not approach our relationship with Roman Catholics with a bigoted attitude. It is incumbent upon us that we exhibit the spirit of Jude 22, 23. Because a person is Catholic does not mean he or she has accepted all Catholic teaching.

We must approach this study with some biblical and historical perspective. God communicated His Word to the world through the Old Testament prophets and the New Testament apostles (Heb 2:1-4). False prophets arose in the Old Testament era, and God gave Israel the means by which they could be identified and rejected (Dt 13:1-5; 18:15-23). False teachers arose in the New Testament, and God gave the early churches warning and means by which they were to be identified and rejected (e.g., 1 Tim 4; 2 Tim 3; 2 Pet 2; Jude). False teachings continued to arise after the age of the apostles and the close of the canon of Scripture. The false teaching of baptismal regeneration appeared in the first hundred years after the apostolic era. The practice of infant baptism was affirmed at the Council of Carthage in 252 AD. We contend that the Roman Church as it exists today is an amalgam of biblical doctrine and false teachings.

Agreement Between Roman Catholic Theology
and New Testament Faith

At the outset we must understand that certain major doctrines are common among Catholics and Bible-believing Christians. To be completely fair to Catholicism, much of the following will be taken from Catholic documents.

Historic Orthodox Christianity

鈥淧art One鈥擳he Profession of Faith鈥� in the Catechism of the Catholic Church develops Catholic doctrine in accordance with the statements of the Apostle鈥檚 Creed.⁵ One author states:

The Roman Catholic Church has proclaimed and defended great doctrines of Christian orthodoxy: biblical theism, the trinity, basic teaching about the person and work of Jesus Christ, his virgin conception, the union of his person of the divine and human nature, the objectively sacrificial character of his death, his bodily resurrection, his ascension to the right hand of the Father, and his second coming into this world.⁶

The Persons of God and Christ

The Catholic Church teaches that there is but one God, who is infinite in knowledge, in power, in goodness, and in every other perfection; who created all things by His omnipotence, and governs them by His Providence.

In this one God there are three distinct Persons 鈥� the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, who are perfectly equal to each other.

We believe that Jesus Christ, the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, is perfect God and perfect Man. He is God, for He 鈥渋s over all things, God blessed forever.鈥� 鈥淗e is God of the substance of the Father, begotten before time; and He is Man of the substance of His Mother, born in time.鈥�

Out of love for us, and in order to rescue us from the miseries entailed upon us by the disobedience of our first parents, the Divine Word descended from heaven, and became Man in the womb of the Virgin Mary, by the operation of the Holy Ghost. He was born on Christmas day, in a stable at Bethlehem.

After having led a life of obscurity for about thirty years, chiefly at Nazareth, He commenced His public career. He associated with Him a number of men who are named Apostles, whom He instructed in the doctrines of the religion which He established.

For three years He went about doing good, giving sight to the blind, hearing to the deaf, healing all kinds of diseases, raising the dead to life, and preaching throughout Judea the new Gospel of peace.

On Good Friday He was crucified on Mount Calvary, and thus purchased for us redemption by His death. Hence Jesus exclusively bears the titles of Savior and Redeemer, because 鈥渢here is no other name under heaven given to men whereby we must be saved.鈥�⁷

The Resurrection of Christ

426 鈥淎t the heart of catechesis we find, in essence, a Person, the Person of Jesus of Nazareth, the only Son from the Father . . . who suffered and died for us and who now, after rising, is living with us forever.鈥� To catechize is 鈥渢o reveal in the Person of Christ the whole of God鈥檚 eternal design reaching fulfillment in that Person. It is to seek to understand the meaning of Christ鈥檚 actions and words and of the signs worked by him.鈥� Catechesis aims at putting 鈥減eople . . . in communion . . . with Jesus Christ: only he can lead us to the love of the Father in the Spirit and make us share in the life of the Holy Trinity.鈥�

639 The mystery of Christ鈥檚 resurrection is a real event, with manifestations that were historically verified, as the New Testament bears witness. In about A.D. 56 St. Paul could already write to the Corinthians: 鈥淚 delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, and that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the Twelve. . .鈥� The Apostle speaks here of the living tradition of the Resurrection which he had learned after his conversion at the gates of Damascus.

The Inspiration of Scripture

105 God is the author of Sacred Scripture. 鈥淭he divinely revealed realities, which are contained and presented in the text of Sacred Scripture, have been written down under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.

For Holy Mother Church, relying on the faith of the apostolic age, accepts as sacred and canonical the books of the Old and the New Testaments, whole and entire, with all their parts, on the grounds that, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, they have God as their author, and have been handed on as such to the Church herself.

106 God inspired the human authors of the sacred books. 鈥淭o compose the sacred books, God chose certain men who, all the while he employed them in this task, made full use of their own faculties and powers so that, though he acted in them and by them, it was as true authors that they consigned to writing whatever he wanted written, and no more.

107 The inspired books teach the truth. 鈥淪ince therefore all that the inspired authors or sacred writers affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully, and without error teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the Sacred Scriptures.⁹

As Bible-believing Baptists, we hold that the Bible is our only rule for faith and practice. Richard V. Clearwaters used to say that there is more disagreement between Bible-believing Baptists and Roman Catholics over practice than there is over faith. We have some profound differences over faith, but we must acknowledge that there are areas of agreement.

Distinctive Tenets of
Roman Catholic Theology¹⁰

The Issue of Authority

Roman Catholic theology adds tradition and the authority of the church to the authority of Scripture. The Second Vatican Council stated this without equivocation. We must cite three lengthy passages, for we need to clearly see Rome鈥檚 teaching.

But in order to keep the Gospel forever whole and alive within the Church, the Apostles left bishops as their successors, 鈥渉anding over鈥� to them 鈥渢he authority to teach in their own place.鈥� This sacred tradition, therefore, and Sacred Scripture of both the Old and New Testaments are like a mirror in which the pilgrim Church on earth looks at God, from whom she has received everything, until she is brought finally to see Him as He is, face to face (see 1 John 3:2) [emphasis mine].¹¹

The Vatican II statement makes clear this distinction between tradition and Scripture. It continues:

Hence there exists a close connection and communication between sacred tradition and Sacred Scripture. For both of them, flowing from the same divine wellspring, in a certain way merge into a unity and tend toward the same end . . . Consequently it is not from Sacred Scripture alone that the Church draws her certainty about everything which has been revealed. Therefore both sacred tradition and Sacred Scripture are to be accepted and venerated with the same sense of loyalty and reverence.¹²

Vatican II leaves no question about the issue of her authority. Chapter II, 鈥淗anding On Divine Revelation,鈥� concludes with this statement:

It is clear, therefore, that sacred tradition, Sacred Scripture and the teaching authority of the Church, in accord with God鈥檚 most wise design, are so linked and joined together that one cannot stand without the others, and that all together and each in its own way under the action of the one Holy Spirit contribute effectively to the salvation of souls.¹³

Rome鈥檚 position is that the Scriptures, tradition, and the teaching authority of the church combine to give God鈥檚 revelation to men and provide for man鈥檚 salvation. The Catechism of the Catholic Church further elaborates on these statements.

80 Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, then, are bound closely together, and communicate one with the other. For both of them, flowing out from the same divine well-spring, come together in some fashion to form one thing, and move towards the same goal. Each of them makes present and fruitful in the Church the mystery of Christ, who promised to remain with his own 鈥渁lways, to the close of the age.鈥�

81 Sacred Scripture is the speech of God as it is put down in writing under the breath of the Holy Spirit. And [Holy] Tradition transmits in its entirety the Word of God which has been entrusted to the apostles by Christ the Lord and the Holy Spirit. It transmits it to the successors of the apostles so that, enlightened by the Spirit of truth, they may faithfully preserve, expound and spread it abroad by their preaching.

82 As a result the Church, to whom the transmission and interpretation of Revelation is entrusted, does not derive her certainty about all revealed truths from the holy Scriptures alone. Both Scripture and Tradition must be accepted and honored with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence.¹⁴

The Catechism also describes the 鈥淢agisterium鈥� or the teaching authority of the church.

85 The task of giving an authentic interpretation of the Word of God, whether in its written form or in the form of Tradition, has been entrusted to the living teaching office of the Church alone. Its authority in this matter is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ. This means that the task of interpretation has been entrusted to the bishops in communion with the successor of Peter, the Bishop of Rome.

86 Yet this Magisterium is not superior to the Word of God, but is its servant. It teaches only what has been handed on to it. At the divine command and with the help of the Holy Spirit, it listens to this devotedly, guards it with dedication and expounds it faithfully. All that it proposes for belief as being divinely revealed is drawn from this single deposit of faith.

87 Mindful of Christ鈥檚 words to his apostles: 鈥淗e who hears you, hears me鈥� the faithful receive with docility the teachings and directives that their pastors give them in different forms.

88 The Church鈥檚 Magisterium exercises the authority it holds from Christ to the fullest extent when it defines dogmas, that is, when it proposes, in a form obliging the Christian people to an irrevocable adherence of faith, truths contained in divine Revelation or also when it proposes, in a definitive way, truths having a necessary connection with these.¹⁵

These three sources of authority comprise a 鈥渢ripod鈥� upon which Rome rests her authority. Note the quotation from Vatican II (n.12).

The Doctrine of the Church

Rome鈥檚 doctrine of the church is central to her claims. The church builds its doctrine of the church around the words 鈥渙ne,鈥� 鈥渉oly,鈥� 鈥渃atholic,鈥� and 鈥渁postolic.鈥� This arrangement of Catholic ecclesiology may be found in the Catechism, the promulgations of Pope Paul VI in Vatican II, and in many other Catholic documents. We will not take the time to examine each of these points.

Rome claims to be the true church by virtue of apostolic succession. The church claims to be the source of salvation.

Coming forth from the eternal Father鈥檚 love, founded in time by Christ the Redeemer and made one in the Holy Spirit, the Church has a saving and an eschatological purpose which can be fully attained only in the future world.¹⁶

771 The one mediator, Christ, established and ever sustains here on earth his holy Church, the community of faith, hope, and charity, as a visible organization through which he communicates truth and grace to all men.¹⁷

This is the foundation of Rome鈥檚 view of the sacraments and of the Virgin Mary.

773 In the Church this communion of men with God, in the 鈥渓ove [that] never ends鈥� is the purpose which governs everything in her that is a sacramental means, tied to this passing world.
[The Church鈥檚] structure is totally ordered to the holiness of Christ鈥檚 members. And holiness is measured according to the 鈥済reat mystery鈥� in which the Bride responds with the gift of love to the gift of the Bridegroom. Mary goes before us all in the holiness that is the Church鈥檚 mystery as 鈥渢he bride without spot or wrinkle.鈥� This is why the 鈥淢arian鈥� dimension of the Church precedes the 鈥淧etrine.鈥� ¹⁸

Rome claims to be the 鈥渟acrament鈥� by which God鈥檚 saving work in Christ is mediated to the world.

774 The Greek word mysterion was translated into Latin by two terms: mystenum and sacramentum. In later usage the term sacramentum emphasizes the visible sign of the hidden reality of salvation, which was indicated by the term mystenum. In this sense, Christ himself is the mystery of salvation: 鈥淔or there is no other mystery of God, except Christ.鈥� The saving work of his holy and sanctifying humanity is the sacrament of salvation, which is revealed and active in the Church鈥檚 sacraments (which the Eastern Churches also call 鈥渢he holy mysteries鈥�). The seven sacraments are the signs and instruments by which the Holy Spirit spreads the grace of Christ the head throughout the Church which is his Body. The Church, then, both contains and communicates the invisible grace she signifies. It is in this analogical sense, that the Church is called a 鈥渟acrament.鈥�¹⁹

This view of the church and salvation rests on the Catholic claim that she is the one true church.

816 The sole Church of Christ [is that] which our Savior, after his Resurrection, entrusted to Peter鈥檚 pastoral care, commissioning him and the other apostles to extend and rule it. . . . This Church, constituted and organized as a society in the present world, subsists in (subsistit in) the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him. The Second Vatican Council鈥檚 Decree on Ecumenism explains: 鈥淔or it is through Christ鈥檚 Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help toward salva-tion, that the fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained. It was to the apostolic college alone, of which Peter is the head, that we believe that our Lord entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant, in order to establish on earth the one Body of Christ into which all those should be fully incorporated who belong in any way to the People of God.鈥�²⁰
845 To reunite all his children, scattered and led astray by sin, the Father willed to call the whole of humanity together into his Son鈥檚 Church. The Church is the place where humanity must rediscover its unity and salvation. The Church is 鈥渢he world reconciled.鈥� She is that bark which 鈥渋n the full sail of the Lord鈥檚 cross, by the breath of the Holy Spirit, navigates safely in this world.鈥� According to another image dear to the Church Fathers, she is prefigured by Noah鈥檚 ark, which alone saves from the flood.

Outside the Church there is no salvation.

846 How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church Fathers? Re-formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body: Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in it.²¹

A Roman Catholic theologian has added clarification to the statements from the Catechism. He observed that 鈥渢he sacrament is a symbol that points to or makes present Jesus. The real presence of Christ is effected by the elements. The sacraments are to be viewed as the instruments, not the original source of that grace.鈥�²²

The Catechism outlines the claim of apostolic succession. The Catholic Church claims that the bishops and the Pope are the successors of Peter and the apostles.

857 The Church is apostolic because she is founded on the apostles, in three ways: 鈥� she was and remains built on 鈥渢he foundation of the Apostles, The witnesses chosen and sent on mission by Christ himself鈥�; 鈥� with the help of the Spirit dwelling in her, the Church keeps and hands on the teaching, the 鈥済ood deposit,鈥� the salutary words she has heard from the apostles; 鈥� she continues to be taught, sanctified, and guided by the apostles until Christ鈥檚 return, through their successors in pastoral office: the college of bishops, 鈥渁ssisted by priests, in union with the successor of Peter, the Church鈥檚 supreme pastor.鈥�²³

The Catechism offers only one biblical 鈥減roof鈥� for the apostolic succession of the bishops. It is a reference to Acts 20:28 in n. 374. This is apparently because Paul uses the word 鈥渙verseer鈥� (episkopos) in this verse. The statement reads:

鈥淭he bishops 鈥� successors of the apostles鈥�
861 In order that the mission entrusted to them might be continued after their death, [the apostles] consigned, by will and testament, as it were, to their immediate collaborators the duty of completing and consolidating the work they had begun, urging them to tend to the whole flock, in which the Holy Spirit had appointed them to shepherd the Church of God. They accordingly designated such men and then made the ruling that likewise on their death other proven men should take over their ministry.²⁴

The document goes on to affirm that the papacy is of divine origin.

862 Just as the office which the Lord confided to Peter alone, as first of the apostles, destined to be transmitted to his successors, is a permanent one, so also endures the office, which the apostles received, of shepherding the Church, a charge destined to be exercised without interruption by the sacred order of bishops. Hence the Church teaches that the bishops have by divine institution taken the place of the apostles as pastors of the Church, in such wise that whoever listens to them is listening to Christ and whoever despises them despises Christ and him who sent Christ.²⁵

This is foundational to receiving the forgiveness of sins in the Roman system.

976 The Apostle鈥檚 Creed associates faith in the forgiveness of sins not only with faith in the Holy Spirit, but also with faith in the Church and in the communion of saints. It was when he gave the Holy Spirit to his apostles that the risen Christ conferred on them his own divine power to forgive sins: 鈥淩eceive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.鈥� ²⁶

Rome constitutes herself through the office of the supreme pontiff and the bishops of the church. The Code of Canon Law describes the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church.

Can. 330 Just as by the Lord鈥檚 decision Saint Peter and the other Apostles constitute one college, so in a like manner the Roman Pontiff, the successor of Peter, and the bishops, the successors of the Apostles, are united among themselves.²⁷

The Holy See is a bureaucracy, but Canon Law delegates final, absolute power to the Supreme Pontiff, stating:

Can. 333 搂1. By virtue of his office, the Roman Pontiff not only possesses power offer [sic] the universal Church but also obtains the primacy of ordinary power offer [sic] all particular churches and groups of them. Moreover, this primacy strengthens and protects the proper, ordinary, and immediate power which bishops possess in the particular churches entrusted to their care. 搂2. In fulfilling the office of supreme pastor of the Church, the Roman Pontiff is always joined in communion with the other bishops and with the universal Church. He nevertheless has the right, according to the needs of the Church, to determine the manner, whether personal or collegial, of exercising this office. 搂3. No appeal or recourse is permitted against a sentence or decree of the Roman Pontiff.²⁸

Catholic Teaching on the Sacraments

Rome declares that the church is the mediator of the sacraments and that the church is, in one sense, a sacrament through which the seven sacraments are mediated.²⁹ The basic dictionary definition of 鈥渟acrament鈥� is: 鈥渋n Christianity, a rite that is considered to have been established by Jesus Christ to bring grace to those participating in or receiving it.鈥�³⁰ The Catholic Church defines 鈥渟acrament鈥� in a specific way:

1076 The Church was made manifest to the world on the day of Pentecost by the outpouring of the Holy Spirit. The gift of the Spirit ushers in a new era in the 鈥渄ispensation of the mystery鈥� the age of the Church, during which Christ manifests, makes present, and communicates his work of salvation through the liturgy of his Church, 鈥渦ntil he comes.鈥� In this age of the Church Christ now lives and acts in and with his Church, in a new way appropriate to this new age. He acts through the sacraments in what the common Tradition of the East and the West calls 鈥渢he sacramental economy鈥�; this is the communication (or 鈥渄ispensation鈥�) of the fruits of Christ鈥檚 Paschal mystery in the celebration of the Church鈥檚 鈥渟acramental鈥� liturgy.鈥�³¹

The function of the sacraments in Rome鈥檚 system then is that the benefits of Christ鈥檚 suffering be communicated by the church through those sacraments. They are the means by which God鈥檚 grace is given to the Church members.

1084 Seated at the right hand of the Father and pouring out the Holy Spirit on his Body which is the Church, Christ now acts through the sacraments he instituted to communicate his grace. The sacraments are perceptible signs (words and actions) accessible to our human nature. By the action of Christ and the power of the Holy Spirit they make present efficaciously the grace that they signify.³²

The very next paragraph affirms that Christ is present in the liturgy and thus in the sacraments.

1085 In the liturgy of the Church, it is principally his own Paschal mystery that Christ signifies and makes present.

1113 The whole liturgical life of the Church revolves around the Eucharistic sacrifice and the sacraments. There are seven sacraments in the Church: Baptism, Confirmation or Chrismation, Eucharist, Penance, Anointing of the Sick, Holy Orders, and Matrimony.³³

The Catechism is clear in stating that grace and salvation are communicated to those who participate in the sacraments, and that the sacraments are necessary for salvation:

1127 Celebrated worthily in faith, the sacraments confer the grace that they signify. They are efficacious because in them Christ himself is at work: it is he who baptizes, he who acts in his sacraments in order to communicate the grace that each sacrament signifies. The Father always hears the prayer of his Son鈥檚 Church which, in the epiclesis of each sacrament, expresses her faith in the power of the Spirit. As fire transforms into itself everything it touches, so the Holy Spirit transforms into the divine life whatever is subjected to his power.

1128 This is the meaning of the Church鈥檚 affirmation that the sacraments act ex opere operato (literally: 鈥渂y the very fact of the action鈥檚 being performed鈥�), i.e., by virtue of the saving work of Christ, accomplished once for all. It follows that 鈥渢he sacrament is not wrought by the righteousness of either the celebrant or the recipient, but by the power of God.鈥� From the moment that a sacrament is celebrated in accordance with the intention of the Church, the power of Christ and his Spirit acts in and through it, independently of the personal holiness of the minister. Nevertheless, the fruits of the sacraments also depend on the disposition of the one who receives them.

1129 The Church affirms that for believers the sacraments of the New Covenant are necessary for salvation. 鈥淪acramental grace鈥� is the grace of the Holy Spirit, given by Christ and proper to each sacrament. The Spirit heals and transforms those who receive him by conforming them to the Son of God. The fruit of the sacramental life is that the Spirit of adoption makes the faithful partakers in the divine nature by uniting them in a living union with the only Son, the Savior.³⁴

Catholic theologians arrange the sacraments in an order, with the Eucharist at the very heart of the system. The arrangement is:

Three sacraments of Christian initiation
Sacraments of healing
Sacraments at the service of communion and the mission of the faithful

鈥淚n this organic whole, the Eucharist occupies a unique place as the 鈥楽acrament of sacraments鈥�: 鈥榓ll the other sacraments are ordered to it as to their end.鈥欌��³⁵

We will give only a brief description of the Catholic Church鈥檚 teaching on each of the sacraments.

1212 The sacraments of Christian initiation 鈥� Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist 鈥� lay the foundations of every Christian life. 鈥淭he sharing in the divine nature given to men through the grace of Christ bears a certain likeness to the origin, development, and nourishing of natural life. The faithful are born anew by Baptism, strengthened by the sacrament of Confirmation, and receive in the Eucharist the food of eternal life. By means of these sacraments of Christian initiation, they thus receive in increasing measure the treasures of the divine life and advance toward the perfection of charity.鈥�³⁶

The church affirms that baptism is necessary for salvation and that in the Eucharist the bread and wine become Christ鈥檚 body and blood.³⁷

The 鈥渟acraments of healing鈥� are penance and the anointing of the sick.³⁸ The Catechism speaks of an 鈥渋nterior鈥� penance, and the description of it is akin to the biblical language concerning conversion.³⁹ Penance can also take many other forms in the life of a Catholic.

1434 The interior penance of the Christian can be expressed in many and various ways. Scripture and the Fathers insist above all on three forms, fasting, prayer, and almsgiving, which express conversion in relation to oneself, to God, and to others. Alongside the radical purification brought about by Baptism or martyrdom they cite as means of obtaining forgiveness of sins: effort at reconciliation with one鈥檚 neighbor, tears of repentance, concern for the salvation of one鈥檚 neighbor, the intercession of the saints, and the practice of charity 鈥渨hich covers a multitude of sins.鈥�

1435 Conversion is accomplished in daily life by gestures of reconciliation, concern for the poor, the exercise and defense of justice and right, by the admission of faults to one鈥檚 brethren, fraternal correction, revision of life, examination of conscience, spiritual direction, acceptance of suffering, endurance of persecution for the sake of righteousness. Taking up one鈥檚 cross each day and following Jesus is the surest way of penance.⁴⁰

1471 The doctrine and practice of indulgences in the Church are closely linked to the effects of the sacrament of Penance.

What is an indulgence?

An indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment due to sins whose guilt has already been forgiven, which the faithful Christian who is duly disposed gains under certain prescribed conditions through the action of the Church which, as the minister of redemption, dispenses and applies with authority the treasury of the satisfactions of Christ and the saints.

An indulgence is partial or plenary according as it removes either part or all of the temporal punishment due to sin. Indulgences may be applied to the living or the dead.

Rome鈥檚 teaching on Purgatory is part of church teaching on Penance.

The punishments of sin

1472 To understand this doctrine and practice of the Church, it is necessary to understand that sin has a double consequence. Grave sin deprives us of communion with God and therefore makes us incapable of eternal life, the privation of which is called the 鈥渆ternal punishment鈥� of sin. On the other hand every sin, even venial, entails an unhealthy attachment to creatures, which must be purified either here on earth, or after death in the state called Purgatory. This purification frees one from what is called the 鈥渢emporal punishment鈥� of sin. These two punishments must not be conceived of as a kind of vengeance inflicted by God from without, but as following from the very nature of sin. A conversion which proceeds from a fervent charity can attain the complete purification of the sinner in such a way that no punishment would remain.⁴¹

1473 The forgiveness of sin and restoration of communion with God entail the remission of eternal punishment of sin, but temporal punishment of sin remains.⁴²

Concerning the anointing of the sick, the Catechism teaches:

1499 By the sacred anointing of the sick and the prayer of the priests the whole Church commends those who are ill to the suffering and glorified Lord, that he may raise them up and save them and indeed she exhorts them to contribute to the good of the People of God by freely uniting themselves to the Passion and death of Christ. ⁴³

The sacrament of last rites falls under this heading.

1524 In addition to the Anointing of the Sick, the Church offers those who are about to leave this life the Eucharist as viaticum. Communion in the body and blood of Christ, received at this moment of 鈥減assing over鈥� to the Father, has a particular significance and importance. It is the seed of eternal life and the power of resurrection, according to the words of the Lord: 鈥淗e who eats my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last day.鈥� The sacrament of Christ once dead and now risen, the Eucharist is here the sacrament of passing over from death to life, from this world to the Father.

1525 Thus, just as the sacraments of Baptism, Confirmation, and the Eucharist form a unity called 鈥渢he sacraments of Christian initiation,鈥� so too it can be said that Penance, the Anointing of the Sick and the Eucharist as viaticum constitute at the end of Christian life 鈥渢he sacraments that prepare for our heavenly homeland鈥� or the sacraments that complete the earthly pilgrimage.⁴⁴

The Catechism ends its discussion of the sacraments with a discussion of holy orders and matrimony.

1533 Baptism, Confirmation, and Eucharist are sacraments of Christian initiation. They ground the common vocation of all Christ鈥檚 disciples, a vocation to holiness and to the mission of evangelizing the world. They confer the graces needed for the life according to the Spirit during this life as pilgrims on the march towards the homeland.

1534 Two other sacraments, Holy Orders and Matrimony, are directed towards the salvation of others; if they contribute as well to personal salvation, it is through service to others that they do so. They confer a particular mission in the Church and serve to build up the People of God.

1535 Through these sacraments those already consecrated by Baptism and Confirmation for the common priesthood of all the faithful can receive particular consecrations. Those who receive the sacrament of Holy Orders are consecrated in Christ鈥檚 name 鈥渢o feed the Church by the word and grace of God.鈥� On their part, 鈥淐hristian spouses are fortified and, as it were, consecrated for the duties and dignity of their state by a special sacrament.鈥� ⁴⁵

Catholic Teaching on Mary

The Catholic Church teaches the immaculate conception of Mary 鈥� the tenet that she was born without sin. 鈥淚t is no wonder therefore that the usage prevailed among the Fathers whereby they called the mother of God entirely holy and free from all stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature.鈥�⁴⁶ The Catechism teaches that Mary was redeemed at birth and free of sin throughout her life.

491 Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, 鈥渇ull of grace鈥� through God, was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854: 鈥淭he most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.鈥�

492 The 鈥渟plendor of an entirely unique holiness鈥� by which Mary is 鈥渆nriched from the first instant of her conception鈥� comes wholly from Christ: she is 鈥渞edeemed, in a more exalted fashion, by reason of the merits of her Son鈥�. The Father blessed Mary more than any other created person 鈥渋n Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places鈥� and chose her 鈥渋n Christ before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before him in love.鈥�

493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God 鈥渢he All-Holy鈥� (Panagia), and celebrate her as 鈥渇ree from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature.鈥� By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.

Rome also teaches the perpetual virginity of Mary. ⁴⁷

499 The deepening of faith in the virginal motherhood led the Church to confess Mary鈥檚 real and perpetual virginity even in the act of giving birth to the Son of God made man. In fact, Christ鈥檚 birth 鈥渄id not diminish his mother鈥檚 virginal integrity but sanctified it.鈥� And so the liturgy of the Church celebrates Mary as Aeiparthenos, the 鈥淓ver-virgin.鈥�

500 Against this doctrine the objection is sometimes raised that the Bible mentions brothers and sisters of Jesus. The Church has always understood these passages as not referring to other children of the Virgin Mary [emphasis mine]. In fact James and Joseph, 鈥渂rothers of Jesus,鈥� are the sons of another Mary, a disciple of Christ, whom St. Matthew significantly calls 鈥渢he other Mary.鈥� They are close relations of Jesus, according to an Old Testament expression.

501 Jesus is Mary鈥檚 only son, but her spiritual motherhood extends to all men whom indeed he came to save: 鈥淭he Son whom she brought forth is he whom God placed as the first-born among many brethren, that is, the faithful in whose generation and formation she co-operates with a mother鈥檚 love.鈥� ⁴⁸

Rome teaches the 鈥淎ssumption of the Blessed Virgin鈥� 鈥� that Mary was taken up to heaven without seeing death. She participated, in a subordinate way, in our salvation.

966 Finally the Immaculate Virgin, preserved free from all stain of original sin, when the course of her earthly life was finished, was taken up body and soul into heavenly glory, and exalted by the Lord as Queen over all things, so that she might be the more fully conformed to her Son, the Lord of lords and conqueror of sin and death. The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin is a singular participation in her Son鈥檚 Resurrection and an anticipation of the resurrection of other Christians: 鈥淚n giving birth you kept your virginity; in your Dormition you did not leave the world, O Mother of God, but were joined to the source of Life. You conceived the living God and, by your prayers, will deliver our souls from death鈥� . . . she is our Mother in the order of grace.⁴⁹

The term 鈥淐oredemptrix鈥� has been used in describing Mary鈥檚 role. Apparently this is not an officially sanctioned term in Catholic theology, but it does represent the concept. Catholic theologians further explain what they mean by Mary鈥檚 role in salvation.

That is all that statement about Mary is saying. Mary had a role, a contribution in filling what was lacking in us, the Church. It鈥檚 a very biblical statement.

Jesus Christ as true God and true man redeems the human family, while Mary as Coredemptrix participates with the Redeemer in his one perfect Sacrifice in a completely subordinate and dependent way. The key word here is 鈥減articipation鈥� in that which is exclusively true of Jesus Christ. The title 鈥淐oredemptrix鈥� never puts Mary on a level of equality with our Lord; rather, it refers to Mary鈥檚 unique and intimate participation with her divine Son in the work of redemption. 鈥淐oredemptrix鈥� is a Latin word; the prefix 鈥渃o鈥� in the title, 鈥淐oredemptrix,鈥� derives from the Latin word 鈥渃um,鈥� which means 鈥渨ith,鈥� not 鈥渆qual to.鈥� Mary鈥檚 sufferings are efficacious towards the redemption of man because they are wholly rooted in the redemptive graces of Christ and are perfectly united to His redeeming will. Similarly, as Mediatrix, the Mother of Jesus does not 鈥渞ival鈥� Christ鈥檚 mediation but rather participates in the one mediation of Jesus Christ. Imagine water from a reservoir reaching the people through a system of aqueducts or channels. By analogy, Jesus is the infinite 鈥渞eservoir鈥� of all grace, which is distributed to us through Mary . . . as she gave birth to Jesus. Jesus, the one mediator, does not exclude secondary, subordinate mediators.⁵⁰

It is easy to see how the term 鈥淐oredemptrix鈥� comes into usage in Catholic theology. The Catechism further states:

968 Her role in relation to the Church and to all humanity goes still further. 鈥淚n a wholly singular way she cooperated by her obedience, faith, hope, and burning charity in the Savior鈥檚 work of restoring supernatural life to souls. For this reason she is a mother to us in the order of grace鈥�

969 This motherhood of Mary in the order of grace continues uninterruptedly from the consent which she loyally gave at the Annunciation and which she sustained without wavering beneath the cross, until the eternal fulfilment of all the elect. Taken up to heaven she did not lay aside this saving office but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation. . . . Therefore the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the Church under the titles of Advocate, Helper, Benefactress, and Mediatrix. ⁵¹

Mary is worthy of special devotion from the faithful.

971 鈥淎ll generations will call me blessed鈥�: 鈥淭he Church鈥檚 devotion to the Blessed Virgin is intrinsic to Christian worship.鈥� The Church rightly honors 鈥渢he Blessed Virgin with special devotion. From the most ancient times the Blessed Virgin has been honored with the title of 鈥淢other of God,鈥� to whose protection the faithful fly in all their dangers and needs. . . . This very special devotion . . . differs essentially from the adoration which is given to the incarnate Word and equally to the Father and the Holy Spirit, and greatly fosters this adoration.鈥� The liturgical feasts dedicated to the Mother of God and Marian prayer, such as the rosary, an 鈥渆pitome of the whole Gospel,鈥� express this devotion to the Virgin Mary.⁵²

Prayer to the Saints

Rome also teaches that Catholics should pray to the saints.

2683 The witnesses who have preceded us into the kingdom, especially those whom the Church recognizes as saints, share in the living tradition of prayer by the example of their lives, the transmission of their writings, and their prayer today. They contemplate God, praise him and constantly care for those whom they have left on earth. When they entered into the joy of their Master, they were 鈥減ut in charge of many things.鈥� Their intercession is their most exalted service to God鈥檚 plan. We can and should ask them to intercede for us and for the whole world.⁵³

Veneration of Images

Rome also teaches the veneration of images. The church strives to distinguish between worship that is due God alone and a secondary adoration of the images. The Catechism states:

2132 The Christian veneration of images is not contrary to the first commandment which proscribes idols. Indeed, 鈥渢he honor rendered to an image passes to its prototype,鈥� and 鈥渨hoever venerates an image venerates the person portrayed in it.鈥� The honor paid to sacred images is a 鈥渞espectful veneration,鈥� not the adoration due to God alone: Religious worship is not directed to images in themselves, considered as mere things, but under their distinctive aspect as images leading us on to God incarnate. The movement toward the image does not terminate in it as image, but tends toward that whose image it is.⁵⁴

The Catholic Encyclopedia summarizes the church鈥檚 teaching on this subject:

As an example of contemporary Catholic teaching on this subject one could hardly quote anything better expressed than the 鈥淐atechism of Christian Doctrine鈥� used in England by command of the Catholic bishops. In four points, this book sums up the whole Catholic position exactly:

It is forbidden to give divine honor or worship to the angels and saints for this belongs to God alone.

We should pay to the angels and saints an inferior honor or worship, for this is due to them as the servants and special friends of God.

We should give to relics, crucifixes and holy pictures a relative honor, as they relate to Christ and his saints and are memorials of them.

We do not pray to relics or images, for they can neither see nor hear nor help us.⁵⁵

Justification and Merit

It is important to understand the Catholic teaching on Justification. We have seen that the Catholic Church claims to be the mediator of salvation to mankind. We have also seen the church teaching that the sacraments convey salvation. These concepts combine in the Catholic statements on Justification. People are justified by faith in Christ and baptism.

1987 The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us 鈥渢he righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ鈥� and through Baptism.⁵⁶

1999 The grace of Christ is the gratuitous gift that God makes to us of his own life, infused by the Holy Spirit into our soul to heal it of sin and to sanctify it. It is the sanctifying or deifying grace received in Baptism. It is in us the source of the work of sanctification.⁵⁷

2020 Justification has been merited for us by the Passion of Christ. It is granted us through Baptism. It conforms us to the righteousness of God, who justifies us. It has for its goal the glory of God and of Christ, and the gift of eternal life. It is the most excellent work of God鈥檚 mercy.⁵⁸

This teaching on Justification is a long-standing position of the church. 鈥淧erhaps the clearest and most systematic exposition of the Catholic theology of justification is that provided by the council of Trent in its sixth session and approved on January 13, 1547.鈥�⁵⁹

The idea of merit figures into Catholic reasoning at this point.

2010 Since the initiative belongs to God in the order of grace, no one can merit the initial grace of forgiveness and justification at the beginning of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life. Even temporal goods like health and friendship can be merited in accordance with God鈥檚 wisdom. These graces and goods are the object of Christian prayer. Prayer attends to the grace we need for meritorious actions.⁶⁰

Conclusion

We must remember that there are areas of agreement between Catholic doctrine and orthodox, traditional Christianity. It is also clear that Rome has added much to those biblical teachings.

We view those additions as errors when they are judged by the standard of revealed Scripture. We evaluate Catholic doctrine by the same standard as we would evaluate any other group鈥檚 doctrine 鈥� the standard of the authoritative Word of God.

It seems to this writer that Roman Catholic theology is built on two fundamental errors. The first error is adding the authorities of tradition and the teaching authority of the church to the authority of Scripture. The second error is the building of the church鈥檚 authority on the biblically unsustainable foundation of apostolic succession. Our fundamental disagreement with Rome is over the issue of authority. Is the Word of God alone the authority, or is Scripture, tradition, and the magisterium the standard?

Other errors grow out of these two. Among them are the Roman Catholic views of the church as a sacrament, sacraments as means of grace, baptismal regeneration, infused justification rather than forensic justification, and merit as affecting salvation.

By your life and testimony, earn the right to witness to Catholic friends. Ask about the Catholic鈥檚 assurance of salvation. A question to ask many unsaved friends of different faiths is: 鈥淒o you know for sure you would go to Heaven?鈥� As in all witnessing, depend on the Holy Spirit to do His work of conviction (Jn 16:7-11).

Though Biblical Christianity has not been without its able defenders in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, its influence has seemed to decline in the West. This is largely because of negative portrayals through the secular media, bombastic 鈥渇undamentalist鈥� leaders, and confusion over the relationship between Christianity and culture. The recent debate between Ken Ham and Bill Nye illustrates the popular secular mood toward fundamentalist Christianity. In a recent interview with Skeptical Inquirer, Bill Nye said,

[By agreeing to the debate,] I held strongly to the view that it was an opportunity to expose the well-intending Ken Ham and the support he receives from his followers as being bad for Kentucky, bad for science education, bad for the U.S., and thereby bad for humankind 鈥� I do not feel I鈥檓 exaggerating when I express it this strongly.²

The most obvious disagreement these men have with each other is over human origins; whether man evolved through chance processes over millions of years, or whether man was created by God鈥檚 direct act as described in Genesis. Nye reflects,

After the debate, my agent and I were driven back to our hotel. We were, by agreement, accompanied by two of Ham鈥檚 security people. They were absolutely grim. I admit it made me feel good. They had the countenance of a team that had been beaten 鈥� beaten badly in their own stadium. Incidentally, if the situation were reversed, I am pretty sure they are trained to feel bad about feeling good. They would manage to feel bad either way, which is consistent with Mr. Ham鈥檚 insistence on The Fall, when humankind took its first turn for the worse. And by his reckoning, we鈥檝e been plummeting ever since.鈥�³

Nye鈥檚 voice represents a chorus of secular scientists and innovators who believe that fundamentalist Christianity, with its commitment to the inspiration and inerrancy of the whole Bible, should not be a valid paradigm for intelligence in the twenty-first century.⁴ Though Nye鈥檚 claim that fundamentalist Christianity is 鈥渂ad鈥� for science education was countered by Ham鈥檚 constant reference to Christian innovators, the idea that Christianity and science are inimical to each other pervades our culture. As scientific innovation assuages our desires for abundance and better health, connectivity, self-expression, research, and entertainment, we are confronted by those who believe the gospel is quickly becoming outdated by scientific and technological advances.

Optimistic Secular Science

Those who share in this belief are primarily secular; that is, they believe in the inherent goodness and trustworthiness of human judgment and endeavor, specifically in popular applications of the scientific method. They also tend to be materialistic, believing that all phenomena, including consciousness, are the strict result of material interactions.⁵ Finally, they are Darwinian evolutionists, viewing secular science as the necessary means of achieving the next great leap in evolutionary advance.

This group largely agrees that we are on the cusp of breath-taking advances in science and technology (as do other groups). They often quote Moore鈥檚 Law which describes how the number of transistors on an integrated circuit doubles every two years. They also point out that as technology becomes more integrated with itself and with humans it is also becoming faster, smaller, and cheaper. They might add that our understanding of the universe is growing more sophisticated, as can be seen with breakthroughs like the genome project and the discovery of the Higgs-boson particle.

Those who consider the future of secular science generally fall into one of three categories, with some overlap between the categories.⁶ First, there are those who are generally pessimistic. They frequently mention the second law of thermodynamics and may point to moral conditions to illustrate the inevitable decay and ultimate failure of the earth and the universe. Second, there are those who think along linear trend lines from past decades to predict what may lie ahead. This model is reliable to a degree in the short-term, but in the long-term as applied a century ago did not well predict the existence of satellite technology and computers. This group generally seems to be satisfied with the status quo in scientific research and prediction. The third group is in or near the hemisphere of 鈥渢he singularitarian.鈥� Time described this group by saying that 鈥渢hey think in terms of deep time, they believe in the power of technology to shape history, they have little interest in the conventional wisdom about anything, and they cannot believe you鈥檙e walking around living your life and watching TV as if the artificial-intelligence revolution were not about to erupt and change absolutely everything.鈥�⁷

The term 鈥渟ingularity鈥� was first used by mathematician Jon von Neumann around 1958 to describe a time when science and technology would progress to the point that human affairs, as we know them, could not continue. In 1993, computer scientist and science-fiction writer Vernor Vinge spoke to a VISION-21 symposium (sponsored in part by NASA) about the probability and nature of such a coming singularity. With a firm belief in evolutionary progress and the necessary emergence of ever-greater intelligence, Vinge predicted the coming of an intelligent machine that would not be subject to humans any more than humans are subject to rabbits, robins, or chimpanzees. While he believes that artificial intelligence (AI) may produce the singularity, he also suggests the possibility that it will emerge through intelligence amplification (IA). The main difference between these two is that AI, in its most mature form, would be more independent of humans while IA is more inter-dependent with them. Vinge believes that IA may be the path to the singularity mainly because of the mystery of human consciousness. He observes that 鈥渂uilding up within ourselves ought to be easier than figuring out first what we really are and then building machines that are all of that.鈥� The benefit of this approach, says Vinge, is that it allows us to participate 鈥渋n a kind of transcendence.鈥� The 鈥渢ranscendence鈥� that he believes helped produce human consciousness is an important theme which will be explored later in this paper.

Today the singularity finds its most popular and utopian expression in Google鈥檚 chief engineer, Ray Kurzweil. Though Kurzweil has not been without sharp criticism,⁸ he has a sizeable following among computer scientists, inventors, CEOs, and futurists. He is a favorite at TED conferences and is known for radically advancing the fields of speech, text, and audio technology. He is also known for his belief that he will soon resurrect his father using relics from his father鈥檚 past, and that he will preserve his own life indefinitely with the help of computer technology.⁹ His TED biography reads, 鈥淗e鈥檚 revered for his dizzying 鈥� yet convincing 鈥� writing on the advance of technology, the limits of biology and the future of the human species.鈥�¹⁰ Impressed by his technological wizardry, Google hired Kurzweil in 2013 to help them advance toward their goal of changing the world and producing various forms of artificial intelligence. He believes the singularity is not more than a few decades away. He is the co-founder and chancellor of Singularity University in Moffett Field, California.

The reach of optimistic secular science (OSS) is not limited to technology specialists. In 2004, as President Obama was running for the U.S. Senate, Google CEO Larry Page gave him a tour which included a look at a flat-panel display which showed Google search activity in real time. The president revealed his belief in progress through technology and evolution as he reflected on this experience in his book The Audacity of Hope.

The image was mesmerizing, more organic than mechanical, as if I were glimpsing the early stages of some accelerating evolutionary process, in which all the boundaries between men 鈥� nationality, race, wealth 鈥� were rendered invisible and irrelevant, so that the physicist in Cambridge, the bond trader in Tokyo, the student in a remote Indian village, and the manager of a Mexican department store were drawn into a single, thrumming conversation, time and space giving way to a world spun entirely of light.¹¹

By 2007, Obama had an impressive Google following apparently because of their mutual approach to problem solving using the internet. Eventually, a few employees even left Google to work for the White House.¹²

The impact of OSS is wide-spread. As I have stated, the most optimistic, if at times strange, expression of OSS is the singularitarian. Jaron Lanier points out that the intentions of the singularitarians are good. They are simply

following a path that was blazed in earlier times by well-meaning Freudians and Marxists. . . . Movements associated with Freud and Marx both claimed foundations in rationality and the scientific understanding of the world. Both perceived themselves to be at war with the weird, manipulative fantasies of religions. And yet both invented their own fantasies that were just as weird.¹³

One of the more odd manifestations of this movement is their commitment to releasing the next stage of evolution through the simulation and reproduction of man鈥檚 mind and the creation of artificial intelligence. Other groups, wittingly or unwittingly, are contributing to their efforts.

Man, The Final Frontier

One singularitarian who is not as utopian as Kurzweil but is just as committed to secular evolutionary ideals is James Barat. Prophesying the rise of super-intelligent machines, he betrays his inability to explain human consciousness by asking, 鈥淲hat鈥檚 so remarkable about the brain鈥檚 processes, even consciousness, anyway? Just because we don鈥檛 understand consciousness now doesn鈥檛 mean we never will. It鈥檚 not magic.鈥�¹⁴ Barat and others seem to realize that the construction of a truly intelligent machine will require unlocking the mystery of human consciousness, which from a materialistic point of view, simply amounts to mapping and simulating the physical processes of the human brain.

Corporate giants like Google, IBM, Microsoft, and Facebook are industry leaders in AI research and development, while companies like Apple and Amazon only more recently have demonstrated interest in AI. Of them all, Google seems to be the most interested in developing something that resembles a human. Their recent acquisition of Kurzweil, the founders鈥� fascination with AI, the activities of their semi-secret 鈥淕oogle X鈥� lab, along with their 2013 absorption of eight major robotics companies shows they have more than a simple 鈥渟earch鈥� on their minds.

Fascination with AI is not limited to the United States. The European Union has organized and is funding The Human Brain Project, which seeks to gain 鈥減rofound insight into what makes us human.鈥� This project promises to 鈥渄evelop six ICT platforms, dedicated respectively to Neuroinformatics, Brain Simulation, High Performance Computing, Medical Informatics, Neuromorphic Computing and Neurorobotics.鈥�¹⁵ MIT Technology Review recognized the Brain Project as one of the top-ten breakthroughs that will have the greatest impact on innovation in the years to come.¹⁶

There are varying opinions on where all of this brain research will lead. Many think that advanced brain research, coupled with the robotics explosion,¹⁷ may de-humanize us by taking our jobs, stripping us of personal relationships, and minimizing traditional categories of intelligence like problem solving and empathy. Margaret Boden believes AI actually has the ability to 鈥渞e-humanize鈥� us, by freeing us to fill more service oriented jobs like the caring professions, education, craft, sport, and entertainment on a part-time basis. John Weaver thus believes that 鈥渂y treating robots like humans, humans can become more human.鈥�¹⁸

Two MIT professors have written Amazon鈥檚 best-selling book in the category 鈥淭he Future of Computing.鈥� Their work is perhaps the most even-handed treatment of our present technological situation.¹⁹ One of the authors, Erik Brynjolfsson, spoke at a TED conference in February, 2013. He believes that AI, or 鈥渢he new machine age,鈥� will revolutionize our lives in ways similar to that of engines, electricity, and the computer. The coming revolution will be more sweeping, however, because AI is digital, exponential, and combinatorial. The solution for humans is not to race against the machine²⁰ but to race with it, since humans working with computers are more powerful than any one human or computer by itself.²¹ This new age is largely based on research that suggests transistor-based computing is about to be replaced by something more dynamic, exponential and combinatorial.

IBM laboratories concur that we have reached the limits of our transistor-based computing power. In order to understand (or 鈥渃ompute鈥�) anything from humans to cities to global financial industries, John Kelly believes that 鈥渙nly through fundamental breakthroughs in physics will we be able to deal with so much complexity and uncertainty on a planetary scale.鈥�²² The most promising path to such computing begins with quantum computing machines, which IBM believes will be produced in the next five to ten years. These machines will be able to crunch mind-boggling numbers at mind-boggling speeds, which may lead to breakthroughs in physics that make technology faster, more powerful, more pervasive, and seemingly more 鈥渁ware.鈥�²³

Quantum computing would be the beginning, not the end, of such 鈥渇undamental breakthroughs in physics.鈥� Perhaps with Barat鈥檚 attitude that human consciousness is not 鈥渕agic,鈥� many secular scientists propose that all of life, including human consciousness, can be obtained and explained mathematically. If this were so, quantum computing is mankind鈥檚 next best bet at cracking the code of human consciousness. Tom Siegfried鈥檚 biography of John Nash, the formulator of Game Theory, illustrates the attempt to understand consciousness using math. This attempt is essentially materialistic with the presupposition of Darwinian evolution. Siegfried believes the promise of Game Theory lies in its ability to unify physics and biology, and perhaps even contribute to a theory of everything (TOE). He states,

As I described in my book Strange Matters, there is something strange about the human brain鈥檚 ability to produce math that captures deep and true aspects of reality, enabling scientists to predict the existence of exotic things like antimatter and black holes before any observer finds them. Part of the solution to this mystery, I suggested, is the fact that the brain evolved in the physical world, its development constrained by the laws of physics as much as by the laws of biology. . . . It鈥檚 clear now that game theory鈥檚 math describes the capability of the universe to produce brains that can invent math. And math in turn, as Asimov envisioned, can be used to describe the behavior guided by those brains 鈥� including the social collective behavior that creates civilization, culture, economics, and politics.²⁴

As neuroscientists monitor 鈥済ame players鈥� in any number of situations, Siegfried projects that 鈥渏ust maybe we鈥檒l see how Nash鈥檚 math can broker the merger of economics and psychology, anthropology and sociology, with biology and physics 鈥� producing a grand synthesis of the sciences of life in general, human behavior in particular, and maybe even, someday, the entire physical world.鈥�²⁵

Spurred by the computer鈥檚 pervasiveness and influence, the world鈥檚 leading money-makers and engineers are pouring their efforts into the production of artificial intelligence. AI, to be fully mature, requires a better understanding of human consciousness so that humans can replicate it and use if for their own ends.

The vast majority of Christians agree that science and technology are valuable disciplines which help us appreciate God and the universe. Intelligence and inventiveness are glorious expressions of being made in God鈥檚 image. It is the widespread influence of OSS, not the concept of science and technology itself, that must be questioned. The fact that intelligence is being based on the degree to which one prescribes to OSS is alarming. Popular and otherwise harmless teachers as well-liked as Bill Nye have suggested that the Christian worldview is simply 鈥渂ad for science.鈥� Others, like Richard Clark, are more subtle. His science-fiction book Breakpoint follows Kurzweil鈥檚 prediction of the Singularity and envisions a world in which 鈥渢errorists鈥� try to halt the advance of technology. He says that 鈥渢here are enormous social and political issues that will arise. There are vast groups of people in society who believe the earth is 5,000 years old. If they want to slow down progress and prevent the world from changing around them and they engaged in political action or violence, then there will have to be some sort of decision point.鈥� Though Clark鈥檚 reference to violence may be overlooked by biblically informed Christians (John 18:36), his reference to 鈥減olitical action鈥� demonstrates his belief that Christianity has no place in a society controlled by OSS.

A New Natural Law

Regina Dugan was the first female director of the Defense Advance Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a research arm of the Pentagon. Using technology like hummingbird drones, she told a TED audience that 鈥渙ur singular mission is the prevention and creation of strategic surprise.鈥� When asked if she is concerned about the 鈥淧andora鈥檚 box鈥� of the irresponsible use of technology, she replied that her job necessarily makes people excited and uncomfortable at the same time. 鈥淥ur responsibility is to push that edge, and we have to be mindful and responsible about how that technology is developed and used. But we can鈥檛 simply close our eyes and pretend that it isn鈥檛 advancing. It鈥檚 advancing.鈥� Ultimately, she admits that she cannot answer questions about the possibly negative implications of advancing technology.²⁶

In a similar setting to that in which Dugan was asked about the implications of advancing technology, Charlie Rose asked Larry Page what quality of mind it is that serves him best in thinking about the future. Page replied, 鈥淲e鈥檝e had a rapid turnover of companies, and I鈥檝e asked, 鈥淲hat did they fundamentally do wrong?鈥� Usually, they just missed the future. So I just try to focus on that and say 鈥淲hat is that future going to be, and how do we create it?鈥濃��

The future, as it is envisioned by leading technology developers, seems to demand the constant emergence of more powerful and intelligent forms of technology. The vision for this technology seems only to be limited by the imaginations of those who are creating it (and, to a degree, by the demand of those who may use it). Suggesting that technology itself has become a new religion, Kevin Kelly of Wired noted,

Because values and meaning are scarce today, technology will make our decisions for us. We鈥檒l listen to technology because our modern ears listen to little else. In the absence of other firm beliefs, we鈥檒l let technology steer. No other force is as powerful in shaping our destiny. By imagining what technology wants, we can imagine the course of our culture.²⁷

The explanation for why technology must advance when its future seems so unclear is a mystery to most secular scientists. Sometimes it is explained as a transcendent evolutionary drive or as our ultimate solution to the problem of evil. Still, when the implications of advancing technology like AI yield unclear and sometimes troubling dilemmas, few seem to question the continued, ambitious pursuit of it. As Einstein observed, 鈥淚t is really a puzzle what draws one to take one鈥檚 work so devilishly seriously. For whom? For oneself? 鈥� one soon leaves, after all. For posterity? No, it remains a puzzle.鈥�²⁸

Einstein was talking about his struggle to 鈥渦nearth deep secrets,鈥� probably a reference to his search for a unified field theory of the universe. While he did not believe in the existence of a personal God, he strangely acknowledged that certain religious men made major contributions to humanity. In 1927 he wrote, 鈥淲hat humanity owes to personalities like Buddha, Moses, and Jesus ranks for me higher than all the achievements of the enquiring and constructive minds.鈥�²⁹ Yet Einstein himself saw that OSS, to which he pledged his ultimate allegiance, provided no epistemological ground for taking religion seriously. A letter he wrote to his friend Otto Juluisburger in 1947 illustrates this. It is about Hitler鈥檚 responsibility in World War II.

I think we have to safeguard ourselves against people who are a menace to others, quite apart from what may have motivated their deeds. What need is there for a criterion of responsibility? I believe that the horrifying deterioration in the ethical conduct of people today stems primarily from the mechanization and dehumanization of our lives 鈥� a disastrous byproduct of the development of the scientific and technical mentality. Nostra culpa! I don鈥檛 see any way to tackle this disastrous short-coming. Man grows cold faster than the planet he inhabits.³⁰

This 鈥渄isastrous shortcoming鈥� is not recognized by all secular scientists and technologists. Steven Weinberg is able to say, 鈥淥ne of the great achievements of science has been, if not to make it impossible for intelligent people to be religious, then at least to make it possible for them not to be religious. We should not retreat from this accomplish卢ment.鈥�³¹ Weinberg believes that OSS is more objective than is religion and that evolution has made us smarter than our religious ancestors.

Soft secular scientists like Einstein and hard ones like Weinberg seem to assume that OSS gives us an ever-increasingly true picture of the world, however cold it may be in Einstein鈥檚 conception. Yet OSS itself cannot define what is comprehensive and true. J.P. Moreland has summarized Larry Laudan鈥檚 remarks in this regard.

Scientific progress does not consist in the progressive convergence on a truer and truer picture of the world. Rather, it is a measure of the relative number, rate, and importance of the various problems science solves, where science may be understood as an entire discipline or as some specific set of theories within a given area of science.³²

He continues,

Thus, the history of science is one of periods of normal science followed by crisis, which gives way to a revolution in which a paradigm shift occurs and ushers in a new period of normal science. The history of science, therefore, is not what the realist claims it to be 鈥� a history of new theories (usually) refining old ones, preserving them as limiting cases, and hence advancing cumulatively toward truer and truer pictures of the world. Rather, it is a history of jerky replacements. Old theories are abandoned, new ones are embraced. . . . [T]he history of science warns us against believing that science, present theories included, is a rational, truth-obtaining enterprise.³³

OSS coupled with advancing technology suggests that man will become more intelligent and 鈥渢rue鈥� as he yields to the transcendent forces of the incoming technological future. Perhaps as Frederick Taylor observed more than one-hundred years ago, we live in an age when human subjectivity must necessarily be displaced by scientific methodology, for only then can the most competent men emerge as leaders for our society.³⁴

Because OSS has no room for the super-natural workings of God in history, neither can it be encumbered by traditional moral values when such values are based on the miraculous working of God in history. The definition of the betterment of man is thus controlled by the acknowledged leaders in the scientific and technological communities. As early as 1943, C.S. Lewis noted the outcome of a secular, evolutionary approach to man鈥檚 mind.

Of course, while we did not know how minds were made, we accepted this mental furniture as a datum, even as master. But many things in nature which were once our masters have become our servants. Why not this? Why must our conquest of nature stop short, in stupid reverence, before this final and toughest bit of 鈥渘ature鈥� which as hitherto been called the conscience of man? You threaten us with some obscure disaster if we step outside it: but we have been threatened in that way by obscurantists at every step in our advance, and each time the threat has proved false. You say we shall have no values at all if we step outside the Tao [loosely used by Lewis to describe general revelation or conscience]. Very well: we shall probably find that we can get on quite comfortably without them. Let us regard all ideas of what we ought to do simply as an interesting psychological survival: let us step right out of all that and start doing what we like. Let us decide for ourselves what man is to be and make him into that: not on any ground of imagined value, but because we want him to be such. Having mastered our environment let us now master ourselves and choose our own destiny.³⁵

Lewis further prophesied that 鈥渨hatever tao there is will be the product, not the motive, of education.鈥�³⁶ As the wizards of OSS pursue their final frontier without any clear historical rationale (they cannot explain human conscious卢ness), direction or controls, we are left to determine whether or not man鈥檚 conquest of nature, in the moment of its consummation, would be 鈥渘ature鈥檚 conquest of man.鈥�³⁷

Battle on the Edge of the Universe

Western culture has adopted the overwhelming presupposition of Darwinian evolution that demands the emergence of a more intelligent and 鈥渢rue鈥� form of society via OSS. This adoption seems to be the main source of epistemological hostility toward the gospel today. As Carl Henry noted, 鈥淢an alone remains, self-sufficient and autonomous, to rescue the cosmos from absurdity and worthlessness.鈥�³⁸ The Christian Scriptures plainly declare that conditions will worsen before the close of history (2 Tim. 3:13). Instead of 鈥渢hrowing rocks鈥� at general and otherwise positive concepts like science and technology, the Christian must understand and address the philosophical under卢pinnings of OSS using God鈥檚 Word.

Messianic Themes within OSS

Christians must maintain an interesting tension between current events and end-times prophecy. One the one hand, we see extreme interpretations which fail because they claim to know the more than approximate time of Christ鈥檚 return.³⁹ On the other hand, those who refuse to consider the significance of their time in history, or perhaps feel jaded because of the abundance of extreme interpretations made in their own lifetimes, fail to heed Christ鈥檚 admonition to 鈥渨atch鈥� for the end (Matt 24:42-44). Christ, who Himself is 鈥渢he Truth鈥� (John 14:6), foretold the coming of imposters and the eventual emergence of the darkest powers in the universe (Matt 24:11; John 5:43, cf. 2 Thes 2:3-4).

It seems strange that although few secular scientists and technologists can articulate where their innovation ultimately comes from or where it will lead, still many of them carry an epistemological hostility toward the gospel. With the publication of Darwin鈥檚 Origin of the Species in 1859 and the popularization of evolution, the idea that knowledge should not be found in the past but in the present and that knowledge is constantly improving has been reinforced.⁴⁰ Some of the brightest hopes first offered in the gospel of Jesus Christ have seemed to find an awkward re-birth within OSS. These hopes include God-like understanding and dominion in the universe, a perfected centralization of power on earth and eternal life with eternal bliss.

God-like understanding and dominion in the universe

In 1988, Freeman Dyson declared in his book Infinite in All Directions that 鈥淕od is what mind becomes when it has passed beyond the scale of our comprehension.鈥�⁴¹ Dyson鈥檚 vision of transcendent order approximates Einstein鈥檚 belief in the 鈥渟heer being鈥� behind the universe that could be approached and manipulated through science. Einstein wrote to a Chicago Rabbi in December 1939,

The religious feeling engendered by experiencing the logical comprehensibility of profound inter-relations is of a somewhat different sort from the feeling that one usually calls religious. It is more a feeling of awe at the scheme that is manifested in the material universe. It does not lead us to take the step of fashioning a god-like being in our own image 鈥� a personage who makes demands of us and who takes an interest in us as individuals. There is in this neither a will nor a goal, nor a must, but only sheer being.⁴²

The surge of energy with which many secular scientists pursue the imagined incoming future stems from a belief that humans are the closest thing to 鈥淕od鈥� that the universe has yet produced. We are complete with consciousness and interpersonal interests and are goal-oriented (i.e., we have a sense of dominion), all of which must be reduced to the 鈥渃ode鈥� inherent in sheer being from which we emerged. But this begs the question: why do we interpret the code with such sensations and drive while the sheer being (or what is behind it) does not?

Einstein鈥檚 鈥渄isastrous shortcoming鈥� betrays his effort to find a theory that truly explains everything. In his attempt to reduce God to sheer being, he is actually recasting God in the image of OSS, which is essentially materialistic (Rom. 1:18-25). The best explanation for human consciousness, interpersonal interests, and man鈥檚 sense of dominion is that we were made in the image of the Biblical God (Gen. 1:26-28), who is fully revealed in Jesus Christ (John 1:14-18). The nature of Christ鈥檚 teachings and miracles demonstrates that 鈥淗e is the fullness of the Godhead bodily鈥� (Col. 2:9) and that a person can only be made complete and ready for the ultimate future if the Spirit of God lives in him (2:10-15). Though man鈥檚 rebellion has skewed the image of God in man (Gen. 3), it can be progressively restored when a person believes in Jesus Christ as Lord for salvation, sanctification (2 Cor. 3:18; Col. 3:10), and glorification (Rom. 8:30), which is the ultimate future.

A perfected centralization of power on earth

Any student of world history and current events can see a movement toward a global centralization of power. This has happened mainly through a kingdom鈥檚 impulse to dominate (cf. James 4:1-3) and is happening today through the spread of secular humanist ideals, economic depression, and technology.⁴³ Concerning those disciplines which touch OSS, it is happening in scientific theory (Game Theory and other attempted TOEs), technological theory (Singularity University and the Human Brain Project), and political theory. The 鈥渢hrumming conversation鈥� of nations envisioned by Obama has been anticipated by technologists who are working on a theory of cities. Such a theory would provide a thorough, language-based understanding of what a city is, how it functions, and how its problems may be addressed.⁴⁴ Unless scientists can crack the code of human consciousness and bridge the gap between OSS and man鈥檚 innate sense of morality, as Lewis pointed out, some human whose power is only limited by his imagination will necessarily have to take the helm of the new world order. Should scientists be able to crack the code, mankind may be able to create their leader;⁴⁵ otherwise, they will have to recognize him.⁴⁶

The hope for a perfected centralization of power on earth ultimately will be realized, but not in the way that OSS imagines. The prophet Isaiah declared that God鈥檚 Messiah would establish an eternal kingdom of peace and prosperity.

For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder, and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, The Mighty God, The Everlasting Father, The Prince of Peace. Of the increase of His government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon His kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever. The zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform this (Isa 9:6-7).

Isaiah also predicted that God鈥檚 Messiah would endure great suffering and die, but that he would conquer sin and death itself to establish his kingdom.

Yet it pleased the Lord to bruise him; He has put him to grief. When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin, he shall see his seed, he shall prolong his days, and the pleasure of the Lord will prosper in his hand. He shall see the travail of his soul and shall be satisfied. By his knowledge shall my righteous servant justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities. Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, and he shall divide the spoil with the strong, because he has poured out his soul unto death (Isa 53:10-12c).

The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ confirm both the Fall of Man (Gen 3; cf. Rom 5) and the ultimate future as described in the Bible.⁴⁷

The Messianic era will be preceded by the visible emergence of the darkest powers of the universe (2 Thes 2:3-10; Rev 13). These powers are essentially lawless and will deceive humans through godless wonders. OSS is one epistemological construct that Satan may use to foment this emergence, characterized as it is by a rejection of divine law, materialism (which is essentially idolatry; cf. Rev 9:20-21), and a dazzling promise to eradicate trouble from the human condition via technology (cf. 1 Thes 5:3).⁴⁸

Eternal Life with Eternal Bliss

Kurzweil and other Singularitarians have expressed a hope to achieve the eternal (or at least very long) preservation of their own lives via science and technology. Barat notes simply, 鈥淏y 2045, human and machine intelligence will have increased a billion-fold, and will develop technologies to defeat our human frailties, such as fatigue, illness, and death.鈥�⁴⁹ What would life without human frailties look like? In his book The Age of Spiritual Machines, Kurzweil carries on a hypothetical conversation with a spiritual machine in 2099, humorous because of the interplay between its supposed future existence and its actual present existence only in Kurzweil鈥檚 mind. Following 鈥渉eartfelt鈥� goodbyes and a lewd invitation from the machine to Kurzweil, the machine finally accedes,

NOW REMEMBER, I鈥橫 READY TO DO ANYTHING OR BE ANYTHING YOU WANT OR NEED.

I鈥檒l keep that in mind.

YES, THAT鈥橲 WHERE YOU鈥橪L FIND ME.

Too bad I have to wait a century to meet you.

OR TO BE ME.

Yes, that too.

Kurzweil thus envisions eternal life and eternal bliss as access to a spiritual 鈥渕achine鈥� that can materialize to meet his every desire. Though I suspect Kurzweil himself is tolerated by less fanciful colleagues because of his impressive resume, some variation of the hope for eternal life with eternal bliss seems to remain prominent within OSS.⁵⁰

Ironically, though OSS champions the idea of accidental existence and human self-sufficiency and autonomy, its adherents cannot well cope with the implications.

Secular man refuses to see himself as merely an animated cog or self-asserting animal, having no real future but only a day after tomorrow empty of lasting life and purpose, a temporary phenomenon without substance and weight that finally succumbs to and in nothingness. Instead of acquiescence in such rote existence and instead of accepting the sheer temporality of his being, he buttresses his personal survival by whatever guarantees for the future may be devised by financial, social or political means. He shores up his being against the threat of nonbeing, generating from his own energies whatever holds promise of self-preservation.⁵¹

The manner in which the promise of eternal life and eternal bliss has been confirmed in the Christian faith is what distinguishes it from other faiths and epistemologies (John 10:24-30; Rom. 1:4). The uniqueness of Christ鈥檚 ability to grant these to his followers, however, does not seem to preclude the possibility that man and Satanic powers will be allowed to experience a counterfeit version of them. The beast that rises out of the sea in Revelation 13:3 experiences the resurrection of one of its heads, probably a reference to the Antichrist. This event results in the whole world worshipping the beast. Rather than ending in eternal bliss for the beast or his followers, however, this resurrection only works to seal their unbelieving fate (13:8; 20:10-15).

Lesson from a Dabbling Theist

Though King Solomon believed in God and was familiar with his nation鈥檚 hope for a Messiah (cf. Gen. 3:16, 49:10, Deut. 18:18; Deut. 17:19), his lavish prosperity led him to dabble in a kind of functional materialism. He wrote in Ecclesiastes 1:10 that 鈥渨hatsoever my eyes desired I kept not from them; I withheld not my heart from any joy.鈥� More than anyone before him he was able to experience the 鈥済ood life.鈥� Still, his observation in 2:11 signals the purpose of his writing: 鈥淭hen I looked on all the works that my hands had done and on the labor in which I had toiled; and indeed all was vanity and grasping for the wind.鈥� Solomon realized that the materialistic worldview is painfully limited. This he expresses clearly in 3:9-22.

Solomon noted that God 鈥渉as put eternity in their hearts, except that no one can find out the work that God does from beginning to end.鈥� Whether done by a secular scientist or a God-fearing Christian, people often try to grasp the whole meaning of life, or 鈥渦nearth deep secrets鈥� as Einstein put it. This is actually evidence that man is an eternal creature. Rather than seeking to achieve a godless explanation of the universe, man must realize that consciousness (man鈥檚 鈥渉eart鈥�) and work are gifts from God and that only God possesses eternal knowledge, authority, and beauty. Solomon knew that 鈥渨hatever God does, it shall be forever. Nothing can be added to it, and nothing taken from it. God does it, that men should fear before him.鈥� This means that God has assigned boundaries to that which man can accomplish so that man may enjoy life and fear God. These boundaries include man鈥檚 brevity of life and mainly his inability to bring himself to the ultimate future, where the problem of evil is solved.

Solomon was not a secular materialist, of course, because the main lesson of his book is 鈥渢o fear God, and keep His commandments鈥� (12:13; cf. Deut. 6:2, 8:6, 13:4). The fear of God is what leads a man to answer correctly Solomon鈥檚 provocative question, 鈥渨ho can bring [man] to see what will happen after him?鈥� He closes his book by declaring 鈥淕od shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil.鈥� Once the law was completed in Jesus Christ (Luke 24:44), the apostle Paul declared that 鈥淕od has appointed a day, in which He will judge the world in righteousness by that man whom He has appointed, whereof He has given assurance unto all men, by raising him from the dead鈥� (Acts 17:31). Jesus Christ is the unique realization of man鈥檚 hope for God-like understanding and dominion in the universe, a perfected centralization of power on earth and eternal life with eternal bliss.

OSS is actually a remarkable form of escapism. In its attempt to escape finiteness, it will ultimately result in the loss of the enjoyment of life and a relationship with God. As it runs from the Biblical concept of sin, it will run out into the cold and dark universe to seek man鈥檚 new home and find new neighbors.⁵² As it strays from the compelling evidence of the Messiah, it will be forced
to settle for an imposter.