F
Flopfoot
Guest
I used to post a few confusing threads about Christian unity, ecumenism and things like that. Then I let it go. But now I think I finally have the words to say what I mean.
So let me define terms in a way that makes sense here -
Unity - Groups joining together to make a single group. The resultant group hopefully has all the people of the original groups and has as its beliefs, values, structure etc, some combination / compromise of what the original groups had (including the possibility that they all take the beliefs and values etc. of just 1 of the original groups).
Alliance - Separate groups working together to pursue a common aim or fight a common enemy.
For example. We can talk about British-American alliance, in fact such a thing exists, in many recent wars they have fought the same enemy together. They don’t have to agree on everything in order to both decide to stop the Germans taking over the world. But the idea of British-American unity is ridiculous - why turn the 2 countries into a single country? Who is going to accept the massive amounts of compromises that need to be made? Likely, both countries will be losing big parts of their values and identity if such a thing was to happen. And what positive purpose would it serve? Would it be worth the trouble? No.
Okay, so I’m pretty sure most of us, including me, believe in Christian alliance / believe that it is a good thing to have. There’s no reason why you can’t have a Catholic cooking soup for homeless people while a Protestant puts the soup into bowls, or vice versa, as we both agree that feeding the homeless is a good thing to do. By combining our efforts on this issue we might possibly be able to feed more people than we could if we worked separately, in which case, this alliance is serving a positive purpose.
To some extent I even believe in monotheistic alliance - there are some issues in the secular world today that Christians, Jews and Muslims could all try to combat together. The soup kitchen is again a possible example of this.
But what about monotheistic unity? Should we merge all three religions into one, and call ourselves monotheists? How are we then going to decide on the divinity of Jesus - will the Christians get out-voted 2 to 1? If that happened, no Christian would ever accept it. All Christians would surely agree, the only way we could ever have monotheistic unity is if all the Jews and Muslims decided to convert to Christianity. I think the Jews and Muslims would probably also say something similar. We’re not going to compromise on the divinity of Jesus - better to remain a separate religion.
Now, the gap, difference, relationship, whatever, between Jews Christians and Muslims, is similar to the relationship between Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestants. In both cases, we have some shared beliefs, and we have some beliefs that are different. In both cases, we are talking about religion, something way too important to compromise on. So just as monotheistic unity would not work, Christian unity will not work either - unless, of course, all the Protestants and Orthodox convert to Catholicism.
There is no way we are going to make compromises about teachings on salvation, the authority of the Church, or the sacraments. No real Catholic will ever accept a mish-mash of different Christian ideas poured into these issues we once taught the full truth on. Better to remain a separate denomination. And any Protestant who wants Christian unity, a single Christian church where all the beliefs and values of the different churches are compromised and mashed into one, clearly doesn’t have very strong beliefs to start with.
The Catholic church already has unity with itself. Christian unity would be like letting the Protestants win - at first we had a solid teaching and a united church, then they split off from us, took up some new ideas and beliefs, and then later come back asking for unity, so that we will have a solid church that includes some of the beliefs they wanted to add but that we refused to add (ie, the very reason they split off in the first place). How ridiculous is that? We’re not going to undo the work of the Council of Trent. You’re in on our terms or you’re out. You’re not in on your own terms.
In short - I believe in Christian alliance. I don’t believe in Christian unity. Drop the idea already! If you want Christian unity, join the Catholic church.
So let me define terms in a way that makes sense here -
Unity - Groups joining together to make a single group. The resultant group hopefully has all the people of the original groups and has as its beliefs, values, structure etc, some combination / compromise of what the original groups had (including the possibility that they all take the beliefs and values etc. of just 1 of the original groups).
Alliance - Separate groups working together to pursue a common aim or fight a common enemy.
For example. We can talk about British-American alliance, in fact such a thing exists, in many recent wars they have fought the same enemy together. They don’t have to agree on everything in order to both decide to stop the Germans taking over the world. But the idea of British-American unity is ridiculous - why turn the 2 countries into a single country? Who is going to accept the massive amounts of compromises that need to be made? Likely, both countries will be losing big parts of their values and identity if such a thing was to happen. And what positive purpose would it serve? Would it be worth the trouble? No.
Okay, so I’m pretty sure most of us, including me, believe in Christian alliance / believe that it is a good thing to have. There’s no reason why you can’t have a Catholic cooking soup for homeless people while a Protestant puts the soup into bowls, or vice versa, as we both agree that feeding the homeless is a good thing to do. By combining our efforts on this issue we might possibly be able to feed more people than we could if we worked separately, in which case, this alliance is serving a positive purpose.
To some extent I even believe in monotheistic alliance - there are some issues in the secular world today that Christians, Jews and Muslims could all try to combat together. The soup kitchen is again a possible example of this.
But what about monotheistic unity? Should we merge all three religions into one, and call ourselves monotheists? How are we then going to decide on the divinity of Jesus - will the Christians get out-voted 2 to 1? If that happened, no Christian would ever accept it. All Christians would surely agree, the only way we could ever have monotheistic unity is if all the Jews and Muslims decided to convert to Christianity. I think the Jews and Muslims would probably also say something similar. We’re not going to compromise on the divinity of Jesus - better to remain a separate religion.
Now, the gap, difference, relationship, whatever, between Jews Christians and Muslims, is similar to the relationship between Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestants. In both cases, we have some shared beliefs, and we have some beliefs that are different. In both cases, we are talking about religion, something way too important to compromise on. So just as monotheistic unity would not work, Christian unity will not work either - unless, of course, all the Protestants and Orthodox convert to Catholicism.
There is no way we are going to make compromises about teachings on salvation, the authority of the Church, or the sacraments. No real Catholic will ever accept a mish-mash of different Christian ideas poured into these issues we once taught the full truth on. Better to remain a separate denomination. And any Protestant who wants Christian unity, a single Christian church where all the beliefs and values of the different churches are compromised and mashed into one, clearly doesn’t have very strong beliefs to start with.
The Catholic church already has unity with itself. Christian unity would be like letting the Protestants win - at first we had a solid teaching and a united church, then they split off from us, took up some new ideas and beliefs, and then later come back asking for unity, so that we will have a solid church that includes some of the beliefs they wanted to add but that we refused to add (ie, the very reason they split off in the first place). How ridiculous is that? We’re not going to undo the work of the Council of Trent. You’re in on our terms or you’re out. You’re not in on your own terms.
In short - I believe in Christian alliance. I don’t believe in Christian unity. Drop the idea already! If you want Christian unity, join the Catholic church.
You may not be able to put an arm where a leg belongs and expect it to work so the two are not interchangable but they still work for the same goal. The good of the body…