Wednesday, August 1, 2007
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Presbyterians & Liturgy - Part IV
Continued from Part III
But now we need to move on to the tougher questions. Why is American Reformed theology so characteristically a-liturgical? What is it about our theology or our ecclesiastical life and history that has created such an a-, even anti-liturgical consciousness? Why don't our theologians even attempt to write a theology of worship? And why are our theologies written without any attempt to integrate and address liturgical texts and practices?
Sure, we have all sorts of books on worship, but not one that attempts to provide a rigorous theological account for a Reformed liturgical service. What we need are serious academic books that would analyze and interact with not only the whole Bible but the history of liturgy in order to bring about a creative synthesis. I guess what I am looking for is something along the lines of what has been done by Catholic, Lutheran, and Orthodox theologians.
I would suggest five broad areas of theological problems that have contributed to English/American Reformed theology’s a-liturgical bent:
1) a characteristically Reformed misunderstanding of the purpose of the Lord’s Day Service,
2) an unbalanced emphasis in post-continental, especially English/American Reformed theology on the immediacy of the Spirit’s work in individual souls,
3) an unhealthy preference in discussions of the regulative principle on discrete “elements of worship” over against questions about order and sequence,
4) an almost complete disregard for the mutual conditioning of liturgy and doctrine (lex orandi, lex credendi) in the life of the church, and
5) a failure to acknowledge the fact that the NT does not simply abrogate but transforms the sacrificial typology of the Old Testament by explaining its fulfillment in Christ and his body, the Church.
In future posts I will comment on each of these five problems.
But now we need to move on to the tougher questions. Why is American Reformed theology so characteristically a-liturgical? What is it about our theology or our ecclesiastical life and history that has created such an a-, even anti-liturgical consciousness? Why don't our theologians even attempt to write a theology of worship? And why are our theologies written without any attempt to integrate and address liturgical texts and practices?
Sure, we have all sorts of books on worship, but not one that attempts to provide a rigorous theological account for a Reformed liturgical service. What we need are serious academic books that would analyze and interact with not only the whole Bible but the history of liturgy in order to bring about a creative synthesis. I guess what I am looking for is something along the lines of what has been done by Catholic, Lutheran, and Orthodox theologians.
I would suggest five broad areas of theological problems that have contributed to English/American Reformed theology’s a-liturgical bent:
1) a characteristically Reformed misunderstanding of the purpose of the Lord’s Day Service,
2) an unbalanced emphasis in post-continental, especially English/American Reformed theology on the immediacy of the Spirit’s work in individual souls,
3) an unhealthy preference in discussions of the regulative principle on discrete “elements of worship” over against questions about order and sequence,
4) an almost complete disregard for the mutual conditioning of liturgy and doctrine (lex orandi, lex credendi) in the life of the church, and
5) a failure to acknowledge the fact that the NT does not simply abrogate but transforms the sacrificial typology of the Old Testament by explaining its fulfillment in Christ and his body, the Church.
In future posts I will comment on each of these five problems.
Monday, July 30, 2007
Sunday, July 29, 2007
Why Some Conservative Presbyterians Don’t Like Liturgy - Part III
Continued from Part II
More Performance Issues
In the previous post I said that one of the chief reasons many Presbyterians don't like liturgy is that they have never experienced a liturgical service that was executed well. Presbyterian ministers don't know how to preform rituals. Part of the problem is they believe they need to be causal and cheeky with the congregation in order to be received as "authentic." As if, authenticity and ritual are antithetical.
Without being overly critical, one can learn even from the mistakes of others. Some years ago I worshipped with my family in a conservative Presbyterian church in another part of town. (Don't try to figure out which town.) The pastor was quite casual and breezy during the entire service. A number of baptisms were scheduled for that morning. When the parents of the infants brought their children forward for baptism, the pastor joined them at the font, but was visibly discombobulated. He had not memorized the names of the covenant children and he had no printed resource at hand. In order to cover his mistake, he told a few jokes about remembering names and then asked the three sets of parents the names of the children. (To be clear, this was not done according to the traditional ritual of some churches where the minister asks “What is the name of this child?” immediately before the administration of the sacrament.)
After this, he then called three elders up front (before the baptism) and had them take the children and parade them around the sanctuary while he was making comments about how cute and sweet they were. After the children were brought back up onto the stage, he baptized each of the children, having again to ask each set of parents the name of their child. After he had baptized them (without using the traditional formula, I might add), the parents were beginning to walk back to their seats when he bellowed out a hearty laugh and said,
“Oh my, I guess we forgot to have the parents take vows. Ho, ha, ha. Well, in case there are any Presbyterian sticklers here who might bring charges against me - Ho, ha, ha - I guess we should ask the parents some questions. But, whoops, I don’t seem to have a copy of the vows, so I’ll just wing it. Parents, do you all love the Lord? . . . Good. Will you promise to bring your children up faithfully? . . . Amen! Well, that about does it. Time to sing a hymn.” At which point he sat down with the congregation and the worship team led the congregation in singing “Go tell it on the mountain.”
Now, maybe you think that this is an extreme example, but I’ve been around enough to know better. When our family was home after that service and eating lunch together, even though I have a strict rule not to critique sermons, services, or churches on the Lord’s Day, especially in the service itself, my older daughters asked me, “Dad, what did you think of the service?”
I answered something like, “Well, it was not like ours. Was it?”
“No, it wasn’t,” they said.
My oldest then felt compelled to say, “You know, if I was one of those three families, I think I would have my baby re-baptized!”
With that, I broke my rule and had a very productive conversation with my children about liturgical protocols and the valuable service it rendered to God’s people. As Paul says to Timothy, “Watch yourself and teaching carefully. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim. 4:16).
Liturgy is not something you can just read about in a book and go do. The one who would lead God’s people into his presence needs mature guidance and a great deal of guided experience under someone skilled in the art of liturgical leadership. Some of us who have been raised in liturgical churches have a distinct advantage. Others, aware of their own deficiencies, have deliberately attached themselves to qualified pastors for mentoring during their seminary training or internship.
If you are already in the pastorate, however, there are ways to acquire adequate competence. I suggest that you use every opportunity when you are not officiating at your own congregation to visit, worship, and carefully observe qualified ministers in more liturgical communions. To this day, I continue to visit orthodox Lutheran and Episcopal churches when I am on vacation, watching, observing , learning, and critiquing their liturgical craft. If you do have some competence in these matters, spend time with ministerial candidates in your church, teaching, training, and guiding them in the fundamentals of liturgical leadership.
Continue Reading Part IV
More Performance Issues
In the previous post I said that one of the chief reasons many Presbyterians don't like liturgy is that they have never experienced a liturgical service that was executed well. Presbyterian ministers don't know how to preform rituals. Part of the problem is they believe they need to be causal and cheeky with the congregation in order to be received as "authentic." As if, authenticity and ritual are antithetical.
Without being overly critical, one can learn even from the mistakes of others. Some years ago I worshipped with my family in a conservative Presbyterian church in another part of town. (Don't try to figure out which town.) The pastor was quite casual and breezy during the entire service. A number of baptisms were scheduled for that morning. When the parents of the infants brought their children forward for baptism, the pastor joined them at the font, but was visibly discombobulated. He had not memorized the names of the covenant children and he had no printed resource at hand. In order to cover his mistake, he told a few jokes about remembering names and then asked the three sets of parents the names of the children. (To be clear, this was not done according to the traditional ritual of some churches where the minister asks “What is the name of this child?” immediately before the administration of the sacrament.)
After this, he then called three elders up front (before the baptism) and had them take the children and parade them around the sanctuary while he was making comments about how cute and sweet they were. After the children were brought back up onto the stage, he baptized each of the children, having again to ask each set of parents the name of their child. After he had baptized them (without using the traditional formula, I might add), the parents were beginning to walk back to their seats when he bellowed out a hearty laugh and said,
“Oh my, I guess we forgot to have the parents take vows. Ho, ha, ha. Well, in case there are any Presbyterian sticklers here who might bring charges against me - Ho, ha, ha - I guess we should ask the parents some questions. But, whoops, I don’t seem to have a copy of the vows, so I’ll just wing it. Parents, do you all love the Lord? . . . Good. Will you promise to bring your children up faithfully? . . . Amen! Well, that about does it. Time to sing a hymn.” At which point he sat down with the congregation and the worship team led the congregation in singing “Go tell it on the mountain.”
Now, maybe you think that this is an extreme example, but I’ve been around enough to know better. When our family was home after that service and eating lunch together, even though I have a strict rule not to critique sermons, services, or churches on the Lord’s Day, especially in the service itself, my older daughters asked me, “Dad, what did you think of the service?”
I answered something like, “Well, it was not like ours. Was it?”
“No, it wasn’t,” they said.
My oldest then felt compelled to say, “You know, if I was one of those three families, I think I would have my baby re-baptized!”
With that, I broke my rule and had a very productive conversation with my children about liturgical protocols and the valuable service it rendered to God’s people. As Paul says to Timothy, “Watch yourself and teaching carefully. Persevere in them, because if you do, you will save both yourself and your hearers” (1 Tim. 4:16).
Liturgy is not something you can just read about in a book and go do. The one who would lead God’s people into his presence needs mature guidance and a great deal of guided experience under someone skilled in the art of liturgical leadership. Some of us who have been raised in liturgical churches have a distinct advantage. Others, aware of their own deficiencies, have deliberately attached themselves to qualified pastors for mentoring during their seminary training or internship.
If you are already in the pastorate, however, there are ways to acquire adequate competence. I suggest that you use every opportunity when you are not officiating at your own congregation to visit, worship, and carefully observe qualified ministers in more liturgical communions. To this day, I continue to visit orthodox Lutheran and Episcopal churches when I am on vacation, watching, observing , learning, and critiquing their liturgical craft. If you do have some competence in these matters, spend time with ministerial candidates in your church, teaching, training, and guiding them in the fundamentals of liturgical leadership.
Continue Reading Part IV
Saturday, July 28, 2007
Trinity & Church XI - More on John 17
Perhaps the best way to unpack the meaning of these enigmatic “oneness” petitions of Jesus is to search the immediate context for clues. There are a few.
For one, verse 23 ends with what appears to be the climactic and therefore defining clarification. Jesus prays that the “perfected unity” of his left-behind community would “let the world know that you sent me, and have loved them, even as you have loved me.”
Here the oneness of Father and Son is the love the Father has for Jesus. The Father’s love for the Son shows up again in v. 24b, where Jesus says that Father has loved him “before the creation of the world.”
Finally, at the end of his prayer, Jesus’ prayer for his disciples is that the “love you have for me may be in them” (v. 26). Jesus asks that the love the Father “had” for the Son may be “in” the church.
It is precisely the divine inter-trinitarian love between Father and Son that Jesus asks be present within the community of disciples. This inter-personal love between the Father and the Son is the paradigmatic “oneness” that the church must participate in and manifest to the world in their own community. Schnackenburg explains, “The unity that is desired is brought about in reciprocal love" (R. Schnackenburg, The Gospel According to John, vol. 3 (London: Burns & Oates, 1982), p. 303.)
Because of its compact formulations, John 17:20-23 invites the reader to explore just how the Father and Son are one by re-reading the Gospel with a view toward discerning the manner in which the loving relations between Father and Son serve as a model for the project of unification that must be “seen” in order that the world will believe.
That a oneness grounded in love for one another is indeed Jesus’ concern in John 17 finds support in John’s epistles. There John uses the same sort of “perichoretic” language to refer to our participation in and imitation of God’s love. “God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16b).
For one, verse 23 ends with what appears to be the climactic and therefore defining clarification. Jesus prays that the “perfected unity” of his left-behind community would “let the world know that you sent me, and have loved them, even as you have loved me.”
Here the oneness of Father and Son is the love the Father has for Jesus. The Father’s love for the Son shows up again in v. 24b, where Jesus says that Father has loved him “before the creation of the world.”
Finally, at the end of his prayer, Jesus’ prayer for his disciples is that the “love you have for me may be in them” (v. 26). Jesus asks that the love the Father “had” for the Son may be “in” the church.
It is precisely the divine inter-trinitarian love between Father and Son that Jesus asks be present within the community of disciples. This inter-personal love between the Father and the Son is the paradigmatic “oneness” that the church must participate in and manifest to the world in their own community. Schnackenburg explains, “The unity that is desired is brought about in reciprocal love" (R. Schnackenburg, The Gospel According to John, vol. 3 (London: Burns & Oates, 1982), p. 303.)
Because of its compact formulations, John 17:20-23 invites the reader to explore just how the Father and Son are one by re-reading the Gospel with a view toward discerning the manner in which the loving relations between Father and Son serve as a model for the project of unification that must be “seen” in order that the world will believe.
That a oneness grounded in love for one another is indeed Jesus’ concern in John 17 finds support in John’s epistles. There John uses the same sort of “perichoretic” language to refer to our participation in and imitation of God’s love. “God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him” (1 John 4:16b).
Note: See Gruenler’s The Trinity in the Gospel of John, for a thorough investigation into the inter-trinitarian personal relations as they are revealed in the interaction between Father, Son, and Spirit in the Fourth Gospel. Even though the Gospel of John was a major source for the patristic doctrine of the Trinity, they never seem to have mined it for its implications for human sociality (see Cornelius Plantinga Jr., “The Fourth Gospel as Trinitarian Source Then and Now,” in Christian Faith and Practice in the Modern World: Theology From an Evangelical Point of View, ed. By Mark A. Noll and David F. Wells [Eerdmans, 1988], pp. 303-321). Augustine, for example, seems so bent on illustrating the ontological unity of the Three that he disparages their social or interpersonal unity. Although he mentions it in passing, he does not linger over it. Jean-Baptiste Du Roy argues that Augustine was enough of a Christian churchman in submission to the written Word to be attracted to ecclesiastical intersubjectivity from John 17 as a viable social analogy for the Trinity, but too beholden to Neoplatonic ontology to fully embrace it (“L’expérience de l’amour et l’intelligence de la foi trinitaire selon saint Aubusin,” Récherches augustiniennes 2 [1962]: 441-43).Continue Reading Part XII
Friday, July 27, 2007
Chef Jeffrey
Okay, well, I guess I have to brag about my son. He loves to watch Food Network. I think he dreams about Rachel Ray. So, anyway. For his birthday this year we sent him to cooking classes for about 4 weeks. This week he had his second class and learned some Italian cuisine. Yesterday evening he cooked his first meal for us. He pretty much did the whole thing from scratch with his notes from his class. I helped a little here and there while the matron of the house watched the news.
"It's your turn, " she said. "I taught the girls." So we had pasta, a homemade Pizza (he even made the dough), and delicious cheeze garlic bread.He's almost like that rodent at the movies. What did the checkout lady at Shop & Save call him? Oh yeah, Rat-tat-tootie.
Oh, and did I forget to say that it was all very tasty.
Why Some Conservative Presbyterians Don’t Like Liturgy - Part II
Continued from Part I
Our Presbyterian brothers and sisters in Christ will never enthusiastically embrace liturgical worship without a pastoral leadership that is not only able to explain its biblical and theological rationale in lessons and sermons, but maybe more fundamental even than didactic expertise, be able to lead liturgical worship with pastoral expertise and sensitivity.
I believe that too many Presbyterians congregations have not experienced the benefits of a liturgical service and this is primarily because our ministers themselves have not experienced anything like the kind of lively, engaging, biblical liturgy of which I speak. And it goes without saying that they have not been sufficiently trained in liturgical leadership. Leaving the theology of the liturgy to one side for the moment, let me address the question of competence in officiating liturgical worship.
Presbyterians congregations don’t like liturgy because their ministers don’t know how to lead such worship. Consequently, since they have had no definitive training, pastors either causally and often rather apologetically and bashfully “lead” worship services without much confidence in their official station as ordained ministers. Worse still, many simply abdicate leadership entirely to “worship committees” and “worship teams.” There are all sorts of “performance” issues, I believe, that obstruct proper appreciation of liturgical worship.
Some “traditional” services are performed so slowly and deliberately that they lack the life and drama that ought to characterize liturgical worship. The minister’s portion of the service may be conducted with such tediousness that no one is inspired to respond with heart-felt words of confession or praise. Hymns may be sung at such a ponderous tempo that many in the congregation look forward to the final stanza. Even if the proper order of approach to God is observed, the leadership can so careless that people fail to appreciate what God is doing for them at any given point in the service.
How might this happen? Let's rehearse a few. A minister (or lay leader) may be too wordy or flippant or casual such that he calls attention to himself rather than functioning as the instrument of God in service to the people. Ministers or lay readers that fail to adequately prepare before the service can divert the congregation’s attention from the Lord’s service to them and their grateful response so that they feel sorry for the man who cannot seem to find his place or the right words to say at any given point in the service. Arguably one of the worst hindrances to worship is ministerial leadership that is not sensitive to the solemnity of the situation and does not therefore carefully serve God’s people in the service. If this is what it means to do traditional worship, our people think, then by all means bring on the spontaneous, congregation-initiated praise. I agree. I would much rather be in a such a service. Frank Seen is onto something when he says,
Continue Reading Part III
Our Presbyterian brothers and sisters in Christ will never enthusiastically embrace liturgical worship without a pastoral leadership that is not only able to explain its biblical and theological rationale in lessons and sermons, but maybe more fundamental even than didactic expertise, be able to lead liturgical worship with pastoral expertise and sensitivity.
I believe that too many Presbyterians congregations have not experienced the benefits of a liturgical service and this is primarily because our ministers themselves have not experienced anything like the kind of lively, engaging, biblical liturgy of which I speak. And it goes without saying that they have not been sufficiently trained in liturgical leadership. Leaving the theology of the liturgy to one side for the moment, let me address the question of competence in officiating liturgical worship.
Presbyterians congregations don’t like liturgy because their ministers don’t know how to lead such worship. Consequently, since they have had no definitive training, pastors either causally and often rather apologetically and bashfully “lead” worship services without much confidence in their official station as ordained ministers. Worse still, many simply abdicate leadership entirely to “worship committees” and “worship teams.” There are all sorts of “performance” issues, I believe, that obstruct proper appreciation of liturgical worship.
Some “traditional” services are performed so slowly and deliberately that they lack the life and drama that ought to characterize liturgical worship. The minister’s portion of the service may be conducted with such tediousness that no one is inspired to respond with heart-felt words of confession or praise. Hymns may be sung at such a ponderous tempo that many in the congregation look forward to the final stanza. Even if the proper order of approach to God is observed, the leadership can so careless that people fail to appreciate what God is doing for them at any given point in the service.
How might this happen? Let's rehearse a few. A minister (or lay leader) may be too wordy or flippant or casual such that he calls attention to himself rather than functioning as the instrument of God in service to the people. Ministers or lay readers that fail to adequately prepare before the service can divert the congregation’s attention from the Lord’s service to them and their grateful response so that they feel sorry for the man who cannot seem to find his place or the right words to say at any given point in the service. Arguably one of the worst hindrances to worship is ministerial leadership that is not sensitive to the solemnity of the situation and does not therefore carefully serve God’s people in the service. If this is what it means to do traditional worship, our people think, then by all means bring on the spontaneous, congregation-initiated praise. I agree. I would much rather be in a such a service. Frank Seen is onto something when he says,
The experience of the Reformation also teaches us that when liturgy goes awry the problem may be less with its form and content than with the way in which it is celebrated and interpreted. Today historic forms of worship are being jettisoned in favor of “alternative liturgies” that employ popular-type songs and dramas with the argument that traditional liturgy is boring or meaningless to occasional (and sometimes even to regular) worshipers. Almost invariably this argument is put forward by pastors who have little competence in presiding at the liturgy in a knowledgeable or compelling way and who may even be insecure in the role of presiding minister. This ritual incompetence includes not only poor public perfor¬mances by ministers, musicians, and congregations but also poor judgment on the part of worship planners in deciding what to add to or subtract from the orders provided in the authorized worship books. Many liturgies get bogged down in extraneous details not specified by the order, or go in uncertain directions ritually and therefore also theologically. It is little wonder that they fail to engage contemporary worshipers. As to the argu¬ment that the liturgy is boring, the historic Western liturgy does not suffer from a monotonous sameness; it has a built-in principle of variation in the rites, customs, and textual and musical options of the church year (“The Reform of the Mass: Evangelical, but Still Catholic” in The Catholicity of the Reformation, ed. by Carl E. Braaten and Robert W. Jenson [Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1996], p. 51-2).
Continue Reading Part III
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Christian Faerie
I'm only halfway through book 7, so I don't have anything to say about that yet. But I thought I would post this talk I did on the novels last year. This was part of a "Cultural Discernment" series that the Associate Pastor and I have been doing for a number of years. We review, critique, and discuss books, movies, etc. about once a quarter. What Should Christians Do With Harry Potter?
WSCDWHP PowerPoint Presentatiion
I gave this talk last year (Nov. 6, 2006) at an evening service. It's an informal talk, not a sermon, so the lecture can be hurky-jerky at times. And I'm using a PowerPoint presentation to illustrate and sometimes read my points. I would suggest downloading both the audio file and the PowerPoint doc.
"The realm of fairy-story is wide and deep and high and filled with many things: all manner of beasts and birds are found there; shoreless seas and stars uncounted; beauty that is an enchantment, and an ever-present peril; both joy and sorrow sharp as swords. In that realm a man may, perhaps, count himself fortunate to have wandered, but its very richness and strangeness tie the tongue of the traveller who would report them. And while he is there it is dangerous for him to ask too many questions, lest the gate should be shut and the keys be lost." -- J.R.R. Tolkien, "On Fairy-Stories."
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
Trinity & Church X - John 17
Continued from Part IX
Consider the trinitarian ground of the “high priestly prayer” of Jesus for the unity of his church (John 17:11, 20-23). Jesus first makes a petition for unity in John 17:11:
That Jesus is speaking about the immediate future and the “survival” of his disciples’ after his own exit is confirmed by what comes after this petition for oneness (vss. 12-19). It is their remaining “in the world” that is Jesus primary concern. Even though he himself is leaving the world, he wants their joy to be complete in the world (v. 13). The world hates them (v. 14), but Jesus prays to his Father not that they be taken out of the world, but “that you protect them from the evil one” (v. 15). They are being “sent into the world” just as Jesus himself was, which is why they must be “sanctified by the truth” (vss. 17-18).
These contextual features argue against a purely “eschatological” reading of Jesus petition for oneness here in v. 11 or in the expanded prayer of vss. 20-23. Jesus is not merely praying for the perfect unity that will be fully established in the Church only at the eschaton. Rather, he is requesting immediate help for his disciples when he shortly leaves them behind. Their survival “in the world” will be dependent in some sense on their experiencing the kind of oneness that exists between Father and Son.
These petitions, therefore, are directly applicable to the issue of ecclesiastical life and unity in the present age. And Jesus expands the prayer to include “those who will believe in me through their message” in 17:20-23. Once again, as we discovered from the context of 17:11, there is nothing here to suggest that Jesus is now praying for a unity that will only be experienced at the Last Day. This eschatological reading ignores the connections between 17:11-19 and the 20-26. It is the same “world,” the one in which Jesus will leave his disciples when he departs, that is now in view when Jesus twice asks that the oneness of the new community (disciples and other belivers) result in the “world believing” that the Father has sent the Son (vss. 21, 23).
Having seen that Jesus prays for the unity of the left-behind community, we are faced with exegetical questions regarding the meaning of this oneness. First, it is a oneness which has as its archetype the unity of Father and Son (“that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you,” v. 21a). "Just as" Father and Son are one, so the community of believers are to be one. But what does the phrase “just as you are in me and I am in you” refer to? What kind of unity does Jesus reference here?
I would suggest that Jesus is not referring to the ontological perichoresis (or circumincessio) that trinitarian theology traditionally uses to describe the shared essence or substance of divinity, or even the mutual interpenetration of the three divine persons. I am not denying the accuracy of such metaphysical assertions. I believe that the metaphysical and/or personal perichoresis of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit can be defended from other passages and maybe even at a secondary level from these passages.
It seems to me, however, that in this passage, where Jesus prays that these human creatures would exhibit the same kind of oneness as the Father and Son enjoy, he cannot have metaphysical or even ontological hypostatic perichoresis in view. Strictly speaking the divine perichoresis is a unique mode of divine existence. Neither is Jesus speaking of the ontological relationship between God and man, as Augustine seems to think (Augustine, Tractates on the Gospel of John 55-111, translated by John W. Rettig, in The Fathers of the Church, vol. 90 [Catholic University of America Press, 1994], p. 290). What is in view in Jesus’ prayer is something inter-personal, something that human creatures can emulate and image, not a metaphysical existence characteristic of the uncreated trinitarian mode of being. Moreover, the oneness that Jesus prays for is capable of maturation or completion (John 17:23), so it must admit of degrees. All of this suggests a oneness that is not fundamentally ontological.
Consider the trinitarian ground of the “high priestly prayer” of Jesus for the unity of his church (John 17:11, 20-23). Jesus first makes a petition for unity in John 17:11:
I will remain in the world no longer, but they are still in the world, and I am coming to you. Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name—the name you gave me—so that they may be one as we are one.Jesus will expand on what this oneness means in vss. 20-23, but here we should note that this is a prayer for his disciples who will remain in the world after he has departed, a prayer that looks forward to the situation immediately following his ascension into heaven. Jesus says to his Father, “I am coming to you,” but the disciples will remain “in the world.” It is this state of affairs—their remaining behind without him in the world—that Jesus addresses in his prayer for their oneness. Somehow they will be “protected” or “guarded” if the Father answers Jesus prayer and grants them to “be one as we are one.”
That Jesus is speaking about the immediate future and the “survival” of his disciples’ after his own exit is confirmed by what comes after this petition for oneness (vss. 12-19). It is their remaining “in the world” that is Jesus primary concern. Even though he himself is leaving the world, he wants their joy to be complete in the world (v. 13). The world hates them (v. 14), but Jesus prays to his Father not that they be taken out of the world, but “that you protect them from the evil one” (v. 15). They are being “sent into the world” just as Jesus himself was, which is why they must be “sanctified by the truth” (vss. 17-18).
These contextual features argue against a purely “eschatological” reading of Jesus petition for oneness here in v. 11 or in the expanded prayer of vss. 20-23. Jesus is not merely praying for the perfect unity that will be fully established in the Church only at the eschaton. Rather, he is requesting immediate help for his disciples when he shortly leaves them behind. Their survival “in the world” will be dependent in some sense on their experiencing the kind of oneness that exists between Father and Son.
These petitions, therefore, are directly applicable to the issue of ecclesiastical life and unity in the present age. And Jesus expands the prayer to include “those who will believe in me through their message” in 17:20-23. Once again, as we discovered from the context of 17:11, there is nothing here to suggest that Jesus is now praying for a unity that will only be experienced at the Last Day. This eschatological reading ignores the connections between 17:11-19 and the 20-26. It is the same “world,” the one in which Jesus will leave his disciples when he departs, that is now in view when Jesus twice asks that the oneness of the new community (disciples and other belivers) result in the “world believing” that the Father has sent the Son (vss. 21, 23).
Having seen that Jesus prays for the unity of the left-behind community, we are faced with exegetical questions regarding the meaning of this oneness. First, it is a oneness which has as its archetype the unity of Father and Son (“that all of them may be one, Father, just as you are in me and I am in you,” v. 21a). "Just as" Father and Son are one, so the community of believers are to be one. But what does the phrase “just as you are in me and I am in you” refer to? What kind of unity does Jesus reference here?
I would suggest that Jesus is not referring to the ontological perichoresis (or circumincessio) that trinitarian theology traditionally uses to describe the shared essence or substance of divinity, or even the mutual interpenetration of the three divine persons. I am not denying the accuracy of such metaphysical assertions. I believe that the metaphysical and/or personal perichoresis of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit can be defended from other passages and maybe even at a secondary level from these passages.
It seems to me, however, that in this passage, where Jesus prays that these human creatures would exhibit the same kind of oneness as the Father and Son enjoy, he cannot have metaphysical or even ontological hypostatic perichoresis in view. Strictly speaking the divine perichoresis is a unique mode of divine existence. Neither is Jesus speaking of the ontological relationship between God and man, as Augustine seems to think (Augustine, Tractates on the Gospel of John 55-111, translated by John W. Rettig, in The Fathers of the Church, vol. 90 [Catholic University of America Press, 1994], p. 290). What is in view in Jesus’ prayer is something inter-personal, something that human creatures can emulate and image, not a metaphysical existence characteristic of the uncreated trinitarian mode of being. Moreover, the oneness that Jesus prays for is capable of maturation or completion (John 17:23), so it must admit of degrees. All of this suggests a oneness that is not fundamentally ontological.
Note: I am willing to grant what Volf claims—that the mutual giving and receiving of love spoken of in this passage and others “presupposes an already existing connection of some sort, however rudimentary” (Volf, After Our Likeness, p. 212). Such an ontological state of affairs may be presupposed in what Jesus prays for, but it does not help us explicate the meaning of the oneness for which he prays. Is there some sense in which God’s perichoretic mode of being as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit has been structurally reproduced within the created existence of humanity? Is the ontology of created human existence such that we inevitably exist in some deep structural sense in perichoretic relation to one another and all “partake” of one common human “nature”? Maybe. I’m not affirming or denying such a philosophical construct. Colin Gunton makes a good argument that the transcendental ground of human sociality resides in God’s trinitarian sociality (The One, the Three, and the Many: God, Creation and the Culture of Modernity, The Bampton Lectures, 1992 [Cambridge University Press, 1993], pp. 210-231). If, however, such a “trinitarian” anthropology is correct, it will have to be defended from other passages. I can find no evidence that John 17:11, 20-23 refers to, or assumes such a state of affairs. Jesus is praying for something that his left-behind community does not posses by virtue of their creation, but possibly something they have lost as post-lapsarian humanity. At any rate, he is praying that the Father grant to them something “extra,” that is the renewal of God’s intention in created human sociality.
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