Devin is all over this. I don't need to be upset about it; you all know my arguments by now, probably, and I've said my peace concerning Leithart personally. This theology is nothing but a dead-end; you either spend your life dreaming of the mental phantasm you call the "Church," blissfully believing that every subtle tweak, every adjustment you make in response to the "shocking" reality that not everyone agrees with you, is from God (and not yourself), or you humbly recognize that some piece of the puzzle is missing, and you go find it. If the basis for the agreement between all Christians--such as it is--is an ecumenical council, (as one example) you must define the term. You must inquire how it got there; you must find out why that is important. You have to carry that forward--if it's part of the rule of faith--as a principle, and apply it in a principled manner. If ecumenical councils are an invaluable part of the definition of the rule of faith, because orthodoxy doesn't exist without it, you can't honestly reject one without at least wondering if you're in the same boat as the other heretics in the dustbin of history. [Reverse Noah-Reagan Combo; nice.--ed.] If you're even remotely honest about it in the end, you're an atheist, or a Catholic. Why? Because notice the end-point of the hermeneutics of suspicion or rupture: You say, "It's all a man-made power grab, and God had nothing to do with it." But the heart of faith is this: To believe that God is faithful. If that is true, then I am as bound to the means by which that faithfulness has been expressed, and the symbol of it, as I am to God Himself. The means of God's faithfulness to us--and to Himself--is the Church. The Church must be visible, else we have nothing to which we are bound, and no way to articulate the common faith we profess.
Leithart should forgo theology, and open a restaurant. A barbecue restaurant. He could perfect a pulled-pork sandwich to end them all, and call it the, "Begging The Question." I kid, but I joke to make the point: I don't care what any Christian community says, unless and until I know that their Symbol has been given and protected by Christ Himself. That's the question behind the question: "Did God say this?" and it's in the end the only one that matters.
Father, gather all Your children, scattered throughout the world, and bring them to the fullness of charity, together with Francis our pope, our bishop, all the bishops and all the clergy. Amen.
Leithart should forgo theology, and open a restaurant. A barbecue restaurant. He could perfect a pulled-pork sandwich to end them all, and call it the, "Begging The Question." I kid, but I joke to make the point: I don't care what any Christian community says, unless and until I know that their Symbol has been given and protected by Christ Himself. That's the question behind the question: "Did God say this?" and it's in the end the only one that matters.
Father, gather all Your children, scattered throughout the world, and bring them to the fullness of charity, together with Francis our pope, our bishop, all the bishops and all the clergy. Amen.
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