The Scandal of Pastoral Authority, cont.
Posted on 31 January 2010
Table of contents for Toward a Theology of Pastoral Authority
- The Roots of Pastoral Authority
- The Scandal of Pastoral Authority
- The Scandal of Pastoral Authority, cont.
- Responding to the (Ab)use of Pastoral Authority
In working through these difficulties, I find it helpful to appeal to authorities (!); in this case St Ignatius’ words ring true, and not only illuminate the issues, but also provide a model for imitation, I think. 1
I do not issue orders to you, as if I were some great person. For though I am bound for the name [of Christ], I am not yet perfect in Jesus Christ. For now I [only] begin to be a disciple, and I speak to you as fellow-disciples with me. For it was needful for me to have been stirred up by you in faith, exhortation, patience, and long-suffering. But inasmuch as love suffers me not to be silent in regard to you, I have therefore taken upon me first to exhort you that you would all run together in accordance with the will of God. For even Jesus Christ, our inseparable life, is the [manifested] will of the Father; as also bishops, settled everywhere to the utmost bounds [of the earth], are so by the will of Jesus Christ.
Ignatius has managed, I believe, to find the right attitude. Remaining aware of his own inadequacy and immaturity, and bearing in mind his dependence on those who allow him the space to perform his office, he also faces the fact that love will not allow him to remain silent, but requires him to require of them metanoia, a setting right of themselves with Christ. He understands that if he and they are to live in harmony with Christ then they must resonate rightly with each other, holding their unique places in the Body with humility and courage, confidently expecting Christ’s judgment to put right whatever may go wrong.
But to be in tune with God, he says, there should be attunement with the bishop (pastor), too:
Wherefore it is fitting that you should run together in accordance with the will of your bishop, which thing also you do. For your justly renowned presbytery, worthy of God, is fitted as exactly to the bishop as the strings are to the harp. Therefore in your concord and harmonious love, Jesus Christ is sung. And man by man, become a choir, that being harmonious in love, and taking up the song of God in unison, you may with one voice sing to the Father through Jesus Christ, so that He may both hear you, and perceive by your works that you are indeed the members of His Son. It is profitable, therefore, that you should live in an unblameable unity, that thus you may always enjoy communion with God.
In this case, talk really is cheap. The proof lies in how the community allows for Christ’s authority to work ‘between’ its members. It requires unbelievable, Spirit-inspired and Spirit-led faith in God to make this community possible, to say the least. It is nothing short of a miracle for such community is decidedly unnatural; such koinonia is ’not of a mere human, but of a spiritual nature’.
No community sustains true Christian fellowship unbrokenly across months, much less years or decades. However impossible it may be ‘naturally’, from a ‘human’ point of view, I nonetheless remain convinced that it is possible supernaturally, even if only for brief periods of time, by the work of the Spirit who liberates us from the contingencies of history, the cause-and-effect realities of ‘normal’ life. We have to continually allow the Spirit to renew our fellowship, to re-Christify it, daily, even from moment to moment. The key, I believe, is to surrender our right to pre-judge one another (based on our experience of one another) and to leave room for Christ’s judgment (based on his experience of us).
Ignatius’ instructions (originally applied to Christians’ relations with non-believers) get to the point. Our ‘forbearance’, or long-suffering, proves that we are their family and they, ours. In this, as in all things, Christ is our model. If he suffered the contradiction of everyone so that he might put them in harmony with the Father and include them in the family of God, then how much more should we suffer the contradictions forced upon us by living with people of greater or lesser faith and wisdom than ourselves? If anything, we should compete to see who can suffer the greater wrong, who can most completely lose himself and come to nothing for the sake of the other.
- See his Epistle to the Ephesians, chs 3-5, 10. ↩
2 responses to The Scandal of Pastoral Authority, cont.
Hey, Chris. Just popping in to say I’m enjoying this series.
I think also you’ve articulated well the tension-riddled lives we live in this time between the times: “No community sustains true Christian fellowship unbrokenly across months…. I nonetheless remain convinced that it is possible supernaturally, even if only for brief periods of time, by the work of the Spirit who liberates….”
Yes. And the order is right—the imperative follows from the indicative, i.e., we’re new creations kata pneuma and thus called to embody this within the Christic community, I think, in precisely the manner you’ve been describing here.
Chris,
Great to hear from you. I had hoped that my time away hadn’t alienated everyone! I have several more posts on these lines; I look forward to your feedback and interaction.