The Global South Anglican site has published today, 6 February 2008, the Anglican Catechism in Outline. This is the fruit of a major theological project . The announcement is as follows:

The Anglican Catechism in Outline (ACIO) project was unanimously endorsed and commissioned by the Global South Primates or their representatives present at its meeting at Kigali, Rwanda, September 2006. It was agreed that an interim report should be sent to the Global South Primates by February 2008 for their comments, and the final report be submitted by June 2008. It is a historic and important project initiated by the Global South at this very critical juncture of the life and witness of our Anglican Communion. 

The Global South Anglican Theological Formation and Education Task Force submitted their Interim Report to the Global South Primates Steering Committee on 6 January 2008.

We commend the Interim Report for careful study and feedback.

A pdf version of the report may be read here

It is an extraordinarily profound document and well worth pondering, weighing and praying over. Thanks be to God for all involved in the drafting of it and in particular for Michael Poon, the convenor of the group. It is a gift to the whole Anglican Communion.

The members of the Global South Anglican Theological and Education Task Force include:

Rev. Dr Joseph Galgalo, Kenya
Dr Edison Muhindo Kalengyo, Uganda
Canon George Ugochukwu Njoku, Nigeria
Canon Dr Michael Nai-Chiu Poon, South East Asia (Convenor)

The following were Corresponding Members for this task:
Bishop Paul Barnett, Australia
Rev. Dr Kevin Donlon, USA
Professor Oliver O’Donovan, UK

click here for the statement from the Task Force

it's disturbing that this document is happy to use 'man' as a word to denote all humans. it's also disturbing to note its commitment to penal substitution as the only understanding of redemption, one that is by no means shared by all anglicans, perhaps not even a majority. more importantly, it reveals itself as not a fit document for the churches of that we now think of as the north, by its terrible use of language. language is more than just the words that are used to say something. language is the air we breath, the water we swim in. any document that can say: 'Mothers have a special role in their closeness to young children, bringing little hands together as they speak words of prayer and sing sweet songs to the Lord' just isn't living in the same world as the rest of us.

this is not a document fit for the anglican communion.

I agree Liddon. I would not claim to be at all typical, but I switched off very quickly. It's just another world.

....and another God.

Whatever happens to the Church of England and the Anglican Communion I hope that there will arise a clearer spiritual contest between the various gods believed in and offered to an unbelieving world by those who believe that Christianity is in some sense true and/or associate themselves in some way with the churches.

And the God who answers in our own and in others' hearts by the fire of judgement and of conviction of sin, and by the gentle whisper of grace and love and salvation - let him be God. 

Phil this sounds like a projection of aspects of yourself - no of G-d.

(How could it be otherwise ?)

More  theological demythologisation needed. More psychological / psychoanalysis would do wonders for the former I would think ! gods a pleny there !

It could be otherwise, and it is otherwise if the God the Bible gives us really exists, really did and said and will do the things the Bible says he did and said and will do, and convinces us by direct supernatural action on our souls that these things are objectively and subjectively true. But that is the contest: who is the real God.

Phil Almond

There is this view that somehow these scriptures were written by some divine pointy finger telling individuals roughly what to put, of which the Church is an interpreter. Er, when did the Church begin? It was the Church communities that in effect wrote these scriptures and so the Church is perfectly entitled to have an ongoing relationship with them in terms of the present day, culture, and the rest. That there are no more scriptures is purely arbitrary: we add to and take away from understanding every day.

For example, we think using sociology or using biology. These are not laid out in the Bible, which had a different world-view. Our effective scriptures, then, include change in the natural world that is local and specific, and relationships of groups analysed from above and below in terms of meaning and power etc. What does it mean to be "obedient" and privilege another way of thinking.

Of course the Bible is one of the identities of Christianity, but it ought not to be privileged at all, nor the creeds for that matter. They are just inheritances, useful and usable but that's it.

Pluralist

Could we explore your view of the Bible (and, presumably, of the Old Testament) set out, at least in part, in your posting 9 February 4.12 p.m?

Take the following passages (I apologise for putting them in the Authorised Version, but that is the version I have conveniently to hand in electronic form)

Romans 1:1-4

Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,

 (Which he had promised afore by his prophets in the holy scriptures,)

Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; And declared to be the Son of God with power, according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead:

2 Timothy 3:14-17

But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them;

And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus.

All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.

1 Peter 1:19-21

We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts:

Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.

For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

Acts 1:15-16

And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples, and said, (the number of names together were about an hundred and twenty,)

Men and brethren, this scripture must needs have been fulfilled, which the Holy Ghost by the mouth of David spake before concerning Judas, which was guide to them that took Jesus.

Mark 12:35-37

And Jesus answered and said, while he taught in the temple, How say the scribes that Christ is the son of David?

For David himself said by the Holy Ghost, The LORD said to my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand, till I make thine enemies thy footstool.

David therefore himself calleth him Lord; and whence is he then his son? And the common people heard him gladly.

All these passages associate God with the production of parts (or the whole of) the Old Testament.

Romans is saying that God (he) promised the gospel by his prophets in the holy scriptures.

2 Timothy is saying that all scripture is given by inspiration of God.

1 Peter is saying that holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Ghost

Acts is saying that the Holy Ghost spoke by the mouth of David.

Mark is saying that David said a psalm by the Holy Ghost.

Would you care to comment on your view of the Old Testament in the light of these passages and comment on these passages in the light of your view of the Old Testament?

Phil Almond

Further to Phil Almond's question Pluralist, how to you understand the origin of the  Ten Commandments? Whie I'm not so sure that the OT paints a picture Cecil de Mille fashion, of a pointy  finger burning out sentences in stone, are you of the view that Moses cooked them up while on the mountain and then passed them off as God' own  work?

Bit sneaky of him if he did wasn't it?

there's no end to the innocent fun a boy can have on his own playing with his concordance, but it doesn't get you anywhere in a discussion about the authority of scripture. trying to prove that the bible is authoritative, just on the basis of biblical texts, is a circular argument. the evidence is judged on a basis of a conclusion already reached in advance of the argument. tom wright's view that the scripture was already there, just waiting to be uncovered from the dross of, for example, the epistle of clement, just won't work. the bible was created by the church and stands under the authority of the church. the church, through its litugry and lectionaries, has already demonstrated its tacit rejection of much of the bible, as unfit for use in worship. lex orandi, lex credendi.

Apologies for slow response

The fact that a book states it is the reception of all truth doesn't mean that even its users should agree. At best I rgard God as a kind of transcendence of a whole variety of different values, so such an overall assessment is not something that goes around writing absolutes into books. Humans might, but it doesn't mean anything much.

I don't regard Moses as a historical character. The material of the first five books is late - it is first the prophets and then the Law, if you like.

The Old Testament, the Hebrew Bible, is a reflection on the vast variety of human experiences but within mythic views. Its use is selective and can inspire by the power of its relfection on the human condition and in its story forms.

The fact that these testaments are normative is a matter of identity. The New Testament is history-like and biography-like regarding Jesus, and of course sets out some of the early theologies of some early Churches.

Pluralist and liddon

This posting is an attempted response to Pluralist and liddon (11 February 2008).

But as a preliminary: I have been assuming, perhaps naively, that all contributors to this website believe that Christianity is in some sense true. And that the debate and disagreement is about in what sense and what are the truths that make up the truth of Christianity.

If this is not the case for any contributor, for instance if the contributor believes that Christianity is definitely false or is not (yet) persuaded that Christianity is in any sense true, then it would be helpful to be told as this affects the lines of argument used in the debate.

The issue raised by Pluralist’s post of 9 February 2008 is how much, if at all, God influenced what the Old Testament writers wrote. The point I was trying to make in quoting the passages from Romans, 2 Timothy, 1 Peter, Acts and Mark’s gospel is that those passages take the view that God had an influence on what they wrote. And it is a reasonable interpretation of the language used that he had a big influence. And these passages, giving examples of the New Testament view of God’s influence on the writing of the Old Testament, can be supplemented by numerous others from several places in the New Testament which indicate the general attitude of the New Testament writers to the Old Testament. For instance in Acts we learn that Paul spent time propounding the view that Jesus of Nazareth is the Messiah promised in the Old Testament; there are a dozen or more instances in the Gospels where Jesus himself or the gospel writers display a high regard, to use no other phrase, for the Old Testament, appealing and submitting to its authority and seeing in the unfolding events the fulfilment of its prophecies.

For me to appeal to the witness of the New Testament as to the source and authority of the Old is not a circular argument. Nor is it necessary for the limited point I am making to justify my view that the New Testament is likewise God’s wholly trustworthy inspired disclosure ‘through human lips and pens’. All that is necessary is that the passages quoted were written by the early Church and give the honest view of the writers on the Old Testament.

If those two points are conceded then it must also be conceded that the early Church would not have agreed with liddon’s assertion

 ‘the bible was created by the church and stands under the authority of the church’(11 February 2008)

nor with Pluralist’s assertion

‘It was the Church communities that in effect wrote these scriptures and so the Church is perfectly entitled to have an ongoing relationship with them in terms of the present day, culture, and the rest’ (9 February 2008).

That is my limited point. Do you accept it?

A postscript:

Pluralist wrote(11 February):

‘At best I regard God as a kind of transcendence of a whole variety of different values, so such an overall assessment is not something that goes around writing absolutes into books’.

I agree. A god like that wouldn’t. Writing as a former atheist who came to believe in the God of the Bible by a long and agonizing journey, might you not be open to reflect that he might be the real God? I know that changing one’s mind is always traumatic and humbling.

Regards