Thornton: St. Anselm, a Guide for Anglicanism Today

 
    Come now, little man,
turn aside for a while from your daily employment,
escape for a moment from the tumult of your thoughts.
    Put aside your weighty cares,
    let your burdensome distractions wait,
    free yourself awhile for God
    and rest awhile in him.
Enter the inner chamber of your soul,
    shut out everything except God
    and that which can help you in seeking him,
    and when you have shut the door, seek him.
Now, my whole heart, say to God,
       'I seek your face,
    Lord, it is your face I seek.'

                                 *

       O Lord my God,

    teach my heart where and how to seek you,

    where and how to find you ...

                                 *

    I confess Lord, with thanksgiving,

    that you have made me in your image,

so that I can remember you, think of you, and love you.

But that image is so worn and blotted out by faults,

    so darkened by the smoke of sin,

    that it cannot do that for which it was made,

    unless you renew and refashion it.

Lord, I am not trying to make my way to your height,

for my understanding is in no way equal to that,

but I do desire to understand a little of your truth

    which my heart already believes and loves.

I do not seek to understand so that I may believe,

    but I believe so that I may understand;

       and what is more,

I believe that unless I do believe I shall not understand.

~ excerpt from Chapter 1 of the Proslogion by St. Anselm of Canterbury

Saint Anselm was Archbishop of Canterbury in the late 11th and early 12th centuries.  Among his writings is the Proslogion (meaning colloquy, or conversation, in this instance between Anselm and God).  The full title given to the work by Anselm himself is Faith in Search of Understanding.

Martin Thornton, in his book English Spirituality, identifies Anselm as the father-founder of the "English School" of Christianity.  In Anselm, we have the first great exemplar of the "affective-speculative synthesis" in theology.  By this, Thornton means that we find in Anselm's writings neither solely passionate, emotional, experiential religious devotion (the affective), nor a coldly logical, purely rational philosophic pursuit (the speculative); rather, we find a true synthesis of the two.  Thornton writes,

The affective-speculative synthesis does not mean an exact fifty-fifty balance, nor is it attained either by adding an occasional devout phrase to a theological work, or by interposing one or two quotations from the Fathers in an affective meditation.  It is a synthesis, not merely a mixture, and the true synthesis is possible to different temperaments.  Everyone has a natural bias to one side or the other, and spiritual health is attained by allowing this bias to be permeated by the other aspect through mental and emotional discipline. 

St. Anselm is often misunderstood precisely because his critics fail to grasp this synthesis, and instead want to peg him as a philosopher in a more post-Enlightenment sense.  For example, the famous, much debated and often criticized "ontological argument" (God is that than which nothing greater can be thought) comes from the Proslogion.  But it was not intended to be a proof of the existence of God in the modern, philosophical sense.  Rather, it was a spiritual-intellectual insight born out the experience of fervent prayer, a desire to know and love God better: faith seeking understanding.  As Thornton puts it, we may well imagine the affective theologian preaching to an audience with a desire to elicit an emotional response, while the speculative theologian is alone in his study, in company only with his books and the keenness of his mind, "but whatever one reads of Anselm, he can only be visualized on his knees, not trying to do anything but worship God.  Approached in this way, Anselm still has much to say to modern English spirituality."  

For St. Anslem, the journey begins with the gift of faith, and continues by and in that faith.  This point is fundamental (I believe that unless I do believe I shall not understand).  But it is not a blind faith.  It is a faith that sincerely and fearlessly seeks understanding.  Truly, we are in need of the example of this saint now as much as ever.  Thornton concludes,

Thus Anselm speaks to modern Anglicanism: we are right to grapple with the deep mysteries of the faith; "blind faith" is not loyalty but sloth.  If doubts arise in the mind, they are to be calmly faced and resolved as the struggle continues, they are hurdles to be jumped as we progress toward understanding and love.  That is truly Anglican, for it is neither "free thought" in the sense that anyone has the right to believe what he likes, nor does it make dogma anything but dogmatic, but it does not impute sin to honest inquiry.

Thus the pastoral answer to intellectual doubt is not that it is wicked to doubt the dogmas of the Church, nor that it does not very much matter.  The answer is in the acceptance of a creative challenge.  So, to a spiritual guide, such difficulties should be neither shocking nor unimportant.  They should be seen as positive not negative, a call to further action: it should be "let us see how to use this" rather than "oh but you must trust the Church" or "try not to worry".  What Anselm is saying, in Sunday school language, is when in doubt go and tell God about it, and keep on arguing: the result could be another Proslogion.

The Anglican Church, therefore, is wise not to promulgate a series of new dogmas, to be held on pain of ecclesiastical censure.  It is very unwise to allow contrary opinions on fundamental doctrine.  Anglicanism needs no Index of prohibited books, not through lack of discipline but because of its Anselmic spirit.  But it is both foolish and unfair not to give positive pronouncements as to what Baptism, Confirmation, the Real Presence and the Virgin Conception really mean, because such dogmatic statements, rather than inhibiting reason and understanding, are the basis of them.  One cannot "believe in order to understand" when one does not know what to believe in the first place; one cannot even indulge in the creative process of doubting.

Peace of Christ.

  

     

Saint Patrick, Devoted to Christ "at the Margins"

Glorious Lord, I give you greeting!
Let the church and the chancel praise you,
Let the chancel and the church praise you,
Let the plain and the hillside praise you,
Let the world's three well-springs praise you,
Two above wind and one above land,
Let the dark and the daylight praise you.
Abraham, founder of the faith, praised you:
Let the life everlasting praise you,
Let the birds and honeybees praise you,
Let the shorn stems and the shoots praise you.
Both Aaron and Moses praised you:
Let the male and the female praise you,
Let the seven days and the stars praise you,
Let the air and the ether praise you,
Let the books and the letters praise you,
Let the fish in the swift streams praise you,
Let the thought and the action praise you,
Let the sand-grains and the earth-clods praise you,
Let all the good that's performed praise you.
And I shall praise you, Lord of glory:
Glorious Lord, I give you greeting!
           ~ Welsh poem, eleventh century, as found in the compilation 
      Daily Readings from Prayers and Praises in the Celtic Tradition, edited by Allchin and de Waal



The above is a hymn of praise that is not from the time of Saint Patrick, nor is it Irish (of course, neither was Patrick himself originally; he was born a Roman Briton in what is today Wales).  Nonetheless, I think it well reflects the spiritually of the patron saint of Ireland, a spirituality that is broad and embracing, knowing God as both intimate daily companion and Lord of Creation, praised by all that is.

The success of Thomas Cahill's book How the Irish Saved Civilization, is well deserved.  It is a wonderful little book, beautifully written in a way that makes scholarship accessible to a broad audience.  The excerpts below are from the chapter in that book entitled, "Good News from Far Off: The First Missionary".

Patrick really was a first -- the first missionary to barbarians beyond the reach of Roman law.  The step he took was as bold as Columbus's, and a thousand times more humane.  He himself was aware of its radical nature.  "The Gospel," he reminded his accusers late in his life, "has been preached to the point beyond which there is no one" -- nothing but the ocean.  Nor was he blind to his dangers, for even in his last years, "every day I am ready to be murdered, betrayed, enslaved -- whatever may come my way.  But I am not afraid of any of these things, because of the promises of heaven; for I have put myself in the hands of God Almighty."

According to Cahill, Patrick was not only the first true missionary beyond the borders of the Roman Empire,  he was also "the first human being in the history of the world to speak out unequivocally against slavery."  Surely, Patrick's own experience as a slave in Ireland played a part in his unmitigated condemnation of slavery.  That experience during his formative years, which also occasioned his conversion, wrought in Patrick an unswerving devotion to Christ and a "core of decency" that was to serve him well in his mission to the Irish.  For, says Cahill, Patrick was at heart "a good and brave man, one of humanity's natural noblemen."  As with all such men and women, he stands out as one who did not conform to many of the conventions of the day, especially if they were an offense to justice and humanity.

His love for his adopted people shines through his writings, and it is not just a generalized "Christian" benevolence, but a love for individuals as they are.  He tells us of a "blessed woman, Irish by birth, noble, extraordinarily beautiful (pulcherrima) -- a true adult -- whom I baptized."  Who could imagine such frank admiration of a woman from the pen of Augustine?  Who could imagine such particularity of observation from most of those listed in the calendar of saints?

He worries constantly for his people, not just for their spiritual but for their physical welfare.  The horror of slavery was never lost on him: "But it is the women kept in slavery who suffer the most -- and who keep their spirits up despite the menacing and terrorizing they must endure.  The Lord gives grace to his many handmaids; and though they are forbidden to do so, they follow him with backbone."  Patrick has become an Irishman, a man who can give far more credibility to a woman's strength and fortitude than could any classically educated man.

In his last years, he could probably look out over an Ireland transformed by his teaching.  According to tradition, at least, he established bishops throughout northern, central, and eastern Ireland: he is primatial bishop at Ard Macha (modern Armagh), a hill away from Emain Macha, seat of the Ulster kings ... By placing his bishops next door to the kings, Patrick hoped to keep an eye on the most powerful raiders and rustlers and limit their depredations.

With the Irish -- even with the kings -- he succeeded beyond measure.  Within his lifetime or soon after his death, the Irish slave trade came to a halt, and other forms of violence, such as murder and intertribal warfare, decreased.  In reforming Irish sexual mores, he was rather less successful, though he established indigenous monasteries and convents, whose inmates by their way of life reminded the Irish that the virtues of lifelong faithfulness, courage, and generosity were actually attainable by ordinary human beings and that the sword was not the only instrument for structuring a society.

Though Patrick's immense influence on his adopted homeland is widely recognized today, Cahill writes that, "In his own time, only the Irish appreciated him for who he was."  In fact, when the tables turned later in the century and the kings on the western coasts of Britain began slave-raiding into Ireland, Patrick's attempts to halt the practice by appealing to his Briton brethren's Christian faith went largely ignored.  Patrick laments, "Can it be that they do not believe that we have received one baptism or that we have one God and Father?  Is it a shameful thing in their eyes that we have been born in Ireland?"   In fact, the British eventually respond to Patrick's "meddling" by seeking to discredit him through a smear campaign.  It is in this context that Patrick writes his Confession, the primary source of our information about him.  In assessing Patrick's confrontations with the people of the land of his birth, Cahill writes:

Patrick, whose awkward foreignness on his return to Britain had been the cause of numerous rebuffs,  knows in his bones the snobbery of the educated Roman, who by the mid-fifth century had every right to assume that Roman and Christian were interchangeable identities.  Patrick, operating at the margins of European geography and human consciousness, has travelled even further from his birthright than we might expect.  He is no longer British or Roman, at all.  When he cries out in his pain, "Is it a shameful thing ... that we have been born in Ireland?" we know that he has left the old civilization behind forever and has identified himself completely with the Irish.

In Saint Patrick, we have more than mere legend.  We have a life lived honestly, faithfully, compassionately, and sacrificially.  It is a life that stands out, both in the Church and in human history, such that it rightly becomes legendary.  Cahill concludes,

In becoming an Irishman, Patrick wedded his world to theirs, his faith to their life.  For Augustine and the Roman church of the first five centuries, baptism, the mystical water ceremony in which the naked catechumen dies to sin, was the foundation of a Christian life.  Patrick found a way of swimming down to the depths of the Irish psyche and warming and transforming Irish imagination -- making it more humane and more noble while keeping it Irish.  No longer would baptismal water be the only effective sign of a new life in God.  New life was everywhere in rank abundance, and all of God's creation was good.  The druids, the pagan Irish priests who claimed to be able to control the elements, felt threatened by Patrick, who knew that a humble prayer could even make food materialize in a barren desert -- because all the world was the work of his Creator-God. 

Almighty God, whose will it is to be glorified in your saints, and who raised up your servant Patrick to be a light in the world:  Shine, we pray, in our hearts, that we also in our generation may show forth your praise, who called us out of darkness into your marvelous light; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.  Amen.
~ The Book of Common Prayer, from the Common of Saints, Of a Missionary

    

  

"That the love wherewith Thou didst love Me may be in them"

"And I have made Thy name known to them, and will make it known; that the love wherewith Thou didst love Me may be in them, and I in them."
~ John 17:26

From today's Daily Office reading, the closing verse of the seventeenth chapter of the Gospel according to Saint John, our Lord's "High Priestly Prayer".  Jesus has revealed the Father to us, and will continue to reveal Him more and more, according as the Spirit of Jesus is within us.  Both the means and the end of this revelation is nothing less than invitation into the love that is the very life and substance of the Triune God.

Peace of Christ.

I Cannot Love Better Than God

A poem by Scott Cairns, from his collection, Philokalia, entitled

The Spiteful Jesus

Not the one whose courtesy
and kiss unsought are nonetheless
bestowed. Instead, the largely
more familiar blasphemy
borne to us in the little boat
that first cracked rock at Plymouth
--petty, plainly man-inflected
demi-god established as a club
with which our paling generations
might be beaten to a bland consistency.

He is angry. He is just. And while
he may have died for us,
it was not gladly. The way
his prophets talk, you'd think
the whole affair had left him
queerly out of sorts, unspeakably
indignant, more than a little
needy, and quick to dish out
just deserts. I saw him when,
as a boy in church, I first
met souls in hell. I made him
for a corrupt, corrupting fiction when
my own father (mortal that he was)
forgave me everything, unasked.



The poem expresses a conviction of mine, which has been a cause of some reflection. I regard it as axiomatic that God is perfection, Ultimate Reality, and the One in whom there is no darkness at all. Any less a concept of God would be a contradiction of who and what God is. Consequently, it is not possible that a man could be more loving than God, or indeed 'more anything' that is good. How is it, then, that we do in fact see men and women who seem to be more compassionate than God? Mere mortals who love unconditionally, even when the love is neither sought nor returned? Who accept with loving embrace the unrepentant sinner? Who forgive without measure, even when no forgiveness has been begged? Is it not enough to answer that, since we do observe such mortals, and to the extent that their behavior surpasses the perceived goodness of God, it must be that our conception of God is 'a corrupting fiction'? I'll confess that I am thinking out loud here, and not very rigorously or systematically, at that. But the discontinuity remains. It is not possible for me to 'out-love' God. So, if I embrace my gay brother in Christ in genuine love, asking nothing of him but that he receive that love in blessing, should I not expect that this love remains but a pale reflection of the full and perfect love which God lavishes on him?


Peace of Christ.

Reflection over a Christmas sermon

From a sermon by Mark Frank:

... But though he was content to be wrapped in swaddling-clothes, and those none of the handsomest, neither, may we not look for a cradle at least to lay him in?  No matter what we may look for, we are like to find no better than a manger for that purpose, and a lock of hay for his bed, and for his pillow, and for his mantle too.  A poor condition, and an humble one indeed, for him whose chariot is the clouds, whose palace is in heaven, whose throne is with the Most High.  What place can we hereafter think too mean for any of us?  Stand thou here, sit thou there, under my foot-stool -- places of exceeding honor compared to this.  What, not a room among men, not among the meanest, in some smoky cottage, or ragged cell; but among beasts?  Whither hath thy humility driven thee, O Saviour of mankind? ...

Thy poverty, O sweet Jesu, shall be my patrimony, thy weakness my strength, thy rags my riches, thy manger my kingdom; all the dainties of the world, but chaff to me in comparison of thee; and all the room in the world, no room to that, wheresoever it is, that thou vouchsafest to be.  Heaven it is wheresoever thou stayest or abidest; and I will change all the house and wealth I have for thy rags and manger.

I was struck by these words when I read them during my prayer time the other day.  I find the closing sentences particularly well crafted, eloquently expressing such a noble and loving devotion to our Lord.  Though, I suppose it would be easy enough to dismiss them as so much sentimentality, that is not how I read them (and I certainly don't doubt Frank's sincerity).  Rather, they have given me pause to consider my own devotion, such as it is.  Can I honestly say that I consider all the riches of this life as "but chaff in comparison" to Christ?

I think of myself as a fairly simple person.  I'm not ambitious.  The idea of being wealthy has never held much attraction for me (good thing, since I don't think I ever will be -- at least not by American standards, which, I grant, are obscene).  I tend to eschew extravagance.  I'm pretty easily satisfied.  Like Tolkien, I'm really a hobbit at heart.  Give me a pint of ale, some good food, and a stack of books by the fire, and I'll not ask for more.  Simple.  And yet, if I'm to be honest, I must admit that I'm pretty attached to my own little luxuries.  I may have relatively modest ideas about what constitutes "the good life", but it's a life I thoroughly enjoy.  Can I honestly say to my Lord, "I will change all the house and wealth I have for thy rags and manger"?

With Saint Brendan I ask, "Shall I abandon, O King of Mysteries, the soft comforts of home?"
And with him I pray, "Help me to journey beyond the familiar and into the unknown.  Give me the faith to leave old ways and break fresh ground with you."

Peace.

  

Redeemable Me (or, Not Totally Depraved, After All)

Lord, we pray that your grace may always precede and follow us, that we may continually be given to good works; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.  Amen
Collect for the Season after Pentecost, Proper 23 

I was thinking about the Incarnation, and about its implications for the way we view the stuff of this earth, particularly our very selves.  In the Incarnation, God has embraced us, His earthy creatures, and this has profound implications for the way we view all manner of things, from our physical bodies to our approach to worship (I blogged about this previously  here).  As I was reflecting over this, I was reminded of something my priest said in a homily a while back.  She spoke of God as viewing humanity (and all creation) as good, at least enough so that we are 'redeemable'.  This is evidenced by the Incarnation, the ultimate and total embracing by God of His creation in Christ.

A further thought then occurred to me.  I don't consider myself a Calvinist, and I should note that I haven't done a lot of deep, scholarly study of Calvin and his theology.  Alright, actually, I can remember TULIP (my powers of information retention are impressive, are they not?).  And what does the 'T' stand for? Total Depravity!  That's pretty strong language, if you ask me.  If 'total' means 'entire', 'absolute', 'through and through', and 'depravity' means, well, 'depravity', then what does it mean to speak of God first loving us, 'while we were yet sinners'?  If we sinners beloved of God are truly and absolutely rotten to the core, sin-saturated beyond even any semblance of good,  then wouldn't we be correct to speak of God as loving that which is depraved?  And is that not a kind of perversion in itself, to love the perverse?  

Now, don't misunderstand me.  I certainly acknowledge that we all (that's right, I'm not just going to politely speak for myself) are beset by sin; we make choices that cause pain for ourselves and others and separate us from each other and from God.  I'm not down with a bland 'I'm o.k., you're o.k.' theology.  I would also say that we are ultimately dependent upon God for all good, for He is the source of every and all good.  But as regards how far we've fallen, I think I would have to draw the line somewhere before we get to 'total depravity.'  I would rather say that we are out of joint, mixed up, not right; as C.S. Lewis put it, 'something has gone wrong'.  But not totally.  God did not leave us entirely without the capacity for good (that should be obvious enough), but created us free, with the ability to choose the good or the evil.  That is not the same as the ability to unite ourselves to God through our own unaided efforts.  But, rather than conceiving of God as loving someone (or something, really) so totally and sickeningly depraved that we may well question the rightness of such love, it makes more sense to me to understand God as loving me, despite my sins, knowing the purposes for which He intended me, and able yet to see the potential my soul retains, however deeply buried it may be.  In the Incarnation, God says 'yes' to that buried good within each human soul.  We are not so far gone as to be beyond redemption.

I'm aware that the great minds and mystics of the Church have wrestled with such questions down through the centuries, plumbing the depths of both mind and spirit in the process (I'm also aware that I am not nearly so well-acquainted with the fruit of their labor as I should be), and so my thinking out loud here may just be so much pretentious rambling.  But, seeing as how I've plodded along this far, I may as well wrap up with a little flirtation with heresy.  I read a statement once (can't remember the source now) along the lines of there being a streak of Pelagianism that runs all through the history of Anglican spirituality.  Well, maybe so.  But then, maybe Pelagius was misrepresented, after all.  Maybe this is what he was getting at.            
Peace.

E. B. Pusey: On Love

Grant us. O Lord, not to mind earthly things, but to love things heavenly; and even now, while we are placed among things that are passing away, to cleave to those that shall abide; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.
~Collect for the Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost

A final post taken from the writings of Dr. Edward Bouverie Pusey.  Pusey was regarded as a great preacher, not for his oratory, but for his depth and zeal.  His passionate love for God, and his desire to see that love imparted throughout the church, is readily displayed in the following.

Faint not, any who would love Jesus, if ye find yourselves yet far short of what He Himself who is Love saith of the love of Him.  Perfect love is Heaven.  When ye are perfected in love, your work on earth is done.  There is no short road to Heaven or to love.  Do what in thee lies by the grace of God, and He will lead thee from strength to strength, and grace to grace, and love to love ...

Think often, as thou canst, of God.  For how canst thou know or love God, if thou fillest thy mind with thoughts of all things under the sun and thy thoughts wander to the ends of the earth, and thou gatherest them not unto God?  Nothing (except wilful sin) so keepeth men tepid and lukewarm and holdeth them back from any higher fervour of love, as the being scattered among things of sense, and being taken up with them away from God.

Bring all things, as thou mayest, nigh to God; let not them hurry thee away from Him.

Be not held back by any thought of unworthiness or by failures, from the child-like love of God.  When we were dead in trespasses and sin, Christ died for us; when we were afar off, Christ recalled us; when lost, Christ sought us; how much more may we reverently love Him, and hope that we are loved by Him, when He has found us, and we, amid whatever frailties, would love Him by Whom we have been loved!

Be diligent, after thy power, to do deeds of love.  Think nothing too little, nothing too low, to do lovingly for the sake of God ... 

"Charity never faileth."  How then is all lost, which tendeth not to love!  O abyss of love, torrent of pleasure, life of them that believe, paradise of delights, comfort of our pilgrimage, reward of the blessed, root of all good, strength in all strife, rest in all weariness!  Why will ye "labor for that which is not bread", and toil for that which satisfieth not; why seek for pleasures which perish in the grasp, and when tasted, become bitterness; why heap up things ye must part with, or why love vanities, when ye have before ye love which cannot weary, cannot sate, cannot change, cannot fail; for Love is the Essence, the Bliss, the Being, the Glory of God; and this may be yours for evermore.  God in Whom are all things, Who is All-Goodness, willeth that ye love Him eternally, and be eternally filled with His Love, and enter into His Joy, the Joy of the Everlasting Father in His Co-Equal Son through the Spirit, of Both Proceeding, the Bond of Both, and that ye should rest in the Bosom of His Love, and His Love rest upon you and fill you for ever.  Will ye not then cast out now, for these few years, what hinders in you the Love of God, that ye may have for ever His Love which passeth all understanding, and be one with God, being filled with the Love of God Who is Love?

E. B. Pusey, Parochial Sermons, volume II