So recently I was looking into the Church fathers and found this blog post by John Piper. I just want to see everyone’s opinions on it and how I can logically and clearly explain to a friend the fallacy of this post.
here it is: …
Welcome cwndl7.
First up I would suggest the personal worthwhileness of reflecting on our own reactions to things we perceive as challenges to our faith - and our motives for needing to convince others. That you are wanting to logically and clearly prove to another the fallacy of something looks noble on the outside. However it is such a wasted opportunity for self-growth when we never question our reasons for
needing to do so (which are sometimes a sign of personal insecurities, spiritual pride, fear of rejection by others, misplaced “loyalty” to a God or insular Church of our own making…and so on). Looking for “fallacies” in other people’s positions to support our own position does seem unnecessarily conflictual an approach. Why not start by appreciating and acknowledging the unspoken truths that this person is trying to stand up for. Sometimes when we take a positive approach like this our felt need to cast another’s argument into outer darkness (and the tendency to emotionally view their very person negatively) recedes. In the end we are about winning human hearts not logical arguments.
But to respond to your immediate concern of the day:
Seventy years after the death of Jesus the churches had neither the collected New Testament nor a living apostle.
That prob cannot be denied.
Neither the experiences nor the teachers of the first 300 years of the church are as reliable as the finished New Testament.
I have no idea who John Piper is. But I would say this is a Protestant view of inspiration/inerrrancy of the “deposit of faith” that was possessed by Jesus’s committed followers.
His basic approach seems to be that the closed “canon” of Scripture books alone has the complete “top of the mountain” view of all the fragmentary understandings/theology learnt by the early Church from Christ. He seems to say that no single Church Father or sub-tradition had it all until this great unity was achieved.
Its a good insight - but underplays a few things.
(i) It suggests that once teachings/theology is written down it therefore becomes easily understandable and needs no further interpretation. This is naiive and it isn’t Catholic.
(ii) So the question becomes “who is the reliable interpreter amongst ambiguous or conflicting interpretations?” Catholics have an answer to that, Protestantism doesn’t seem to.
(iii) Whence the source of the unity/authority that made the NT a coherent, “finished” whole? There are many writings that did not make it into the finished NT. Whence the source of unity/reliability that decided these things? Hence there must have been a living tradition/community and source of unity operating alongside the written Word that had the confidence and reliability to judge what was acceptable and what was not. Dynamic, living sources of unity, insight and confidence in Christ’s full Word therefore must have been at work as a leaven in these “embattled” and disunited times - even if they may have been lone voices crying in the wilderness for some time. The Catholic Church holds that it has always been the See of Peter (and his “school” of disciples) who saw itself especially mandated to exercise the mandate given to all Chist’s followers “that they be one as You and I are one.” There is no doubt that Constantine and later Christian secular authority “forced” some of this unity through temporal authority.
(iv) Anyhow, an isolated Father of the Church (as now) didn’t really need to know it all did he? Today we still don’t know it all. We know more, we will never know it all. We cross each bridge as we come to them,witnessing to the deep values of Christ and building practice, laws and theologies/insights accordingly. In any case the Father and leaders of Christian communities were not as isolated as all that. They still had their councils and gatherings well before the NT canon was closed. Indeed, how could the NT canon be closed and “finished” without them. In a sense the NT will never be closed - but that is a Catholic insight (e.g. the Asssumption defined in the last centuary is not mentioned in the NT).
The church did not rescue the New Testament from neglect and abuse. The New Testament rescued the early church from instability and error.
I like this turn of phrase as it gets one thinking in ways we are not used to. However, for Catholics, it is hyperbole (exaggeration for the sake of getting a true point across). Yes, the New Testament (like the Creeds and the Catechism) have been great tools for preserving clarity of teaching and values and what keeps us together…i.e. rescuing the church from instability and error.
But all these tools are expressions of something deeper, namely the living tradition of the christian community - especially steered through its leaders and especially the See of Peter.
You will therefore get nowhere with your friend if you pursue the tack you seem to want to take. Protestantism denies authority beyond the words of Scripture. And this is the assumed assumption behind John Pipers writing above.
The real question for Protestantism is “who decides what Scripture means after all the exegetes/scholars have done their work and ambiguity still remains?”
But as I have suggested at the start, this is purely an intellectual/logical question. Noone is ever won over by logic/reason alone, or even predominantly. The best “argument” for your friend is simply your self-secure, non-defensive, non-threatening reactions and a continued life of humble sacrifice/service towards her/him. Good luck.
(maybe…?)