January 21
Last week you presented how the Gospel of Wrath originated. The narrowness may have made sense when people could believe that God created the entire universe a few thousand years ago and when the ‘known’ world was Christian. How is it possible for modern Christians to believe in a God of love and justice who denied salvation to multitudes in most periods of history and most countries of the world?
GQ
copywrite http://www.believers-dilemma.org/ January 21, 2012
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Dear GQ
Original Sin was devised by Augustine in the 4th century as part of a war of religion fought with the Pagans of the Roman Empire. Christians had become the majority in Asia Minor, which is modern day Turkey, and along the Mediterranean coast of North Africa, which was where Augustine had his base of supporters lived. Most of the European parts of the Roman Empire were still Pagan. A true war of religion would have decimated the Empire and it is unlikely that Christians would have emerged victorious except in Turkey, the Middle East and North Africa.
The genius of using Original Sin as a weapon of mass conversion was that the entire Roman Empire was converted to Christianity within a generation with virtually no loss of Christian lives and with very few Pagan casualties. It is quite easy to understand how the campaign appeared to Christian Bishops as divinely inspired and blessed.
The Emperor played the role of bad cop by persecuting Pagans, imposing civil penalties, denying employment and shuttering temples. Christian bishops played the role of good cop by offering freedom from intolerable civil persecution in exchange for receiving a few drops of baptismal water. As a bonus, the sacrament of Christian baptism provided a remedy for original sin and offered Pagan converts the hope of eternal life. It was a perfect win-win proposition and an offer that Pagans could not and did not refuse.
No one in the 4th century referred to the new regime as a Gospel of Wrath. Augustine wrote quite convincingly, in his magnum opus The City of God, that all the suffering that the Roman Empire was experiencing in the 4th century was due to the evils of Paganism and all the blessings were due to Christianity. Subsequent historians have disagreed, but not on the grounds that Augustinian Christianity created a violent Gospel of Wrath. The great British historian Edward Gibbon in The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire accused Christianity of destroying the Empire by stripping Romans of their warrior virtues; Christians were too weak, pacifist, and focussed on heaven to successfully defend an earthly Empire.
The only disturbing symptom of Original Sin diagnosed by Augustine’s contemporaries was infant damnation. Augustine shifted the cause of divine wrath from personal sin to Original Sin, inherited at birth. This inescapable curse was the cornerstone of Augustine’s campaign of mass conversion. There were many virtuous Pagans and Jews in the Roman Empire who insisted that they and their children were blessed by the Gods of their ancestors. It was precisely these virtuous people who posed the greatest threat to a successful campaign of mass conversion. Augustine fully understood that they and their children must be totally and eternally cursed with the Original Sin inherited from Adam. There could be no exceptions. The remedy was quick and easy: a few drops of baptismal water.
High infant mortality rates provided a powerful incentive for Christians and Pagans alike to have children baptised at the first possible moment. Unfortunately some babies died before they could be baptized. This is where the Gospel of Wrath began to reveal its ugly nature. Augustine’s entire system was dependant on compulsory baptism for all ‘sinners’. A single loophole would allow entire Pagan populations to claim exemptions. So Augustine permitted no exceptions: children dying without baptism would be excluded from both the Kingdom of heaven and eternal life.
Christians have always been appalled by Augustine’s condemnation of unbaptized babies. The policy has been dismissed as a regrettable error in an otherwise glorious career by one of the great pillars of the Christian Church. No Christian outside the original Apostles is more highly regarded than Augustine, by Catholics and Protestants alike. The generation of Bishops and theologians after Augustine quietly repaired the damage by creating a new resting place for unbaptized infants: Limbo. Parents would have preferred their dead babies to be carried directly to heaven, but as long as their deceased darlings were spared eternal torment, Limbo was a tolerable compromise. Catholics have never been fully convinced of the theological justification for Limbo or of its compatibility with divine love and justice. As recently as 2005, Catholic Bishops questioned the legitimacy of Limbo. Pope John Paul II agreed and so did Benedict XVI.
The highest ranking Catholics of the modern world are in agreement that Limbo was not taught by the Early Church and is in contradiction with the teachings of the Church.
In the 1985 book-length interview, "The Ratzinger Report," the future Pope Benedict said, "Limbo was never a defined truth of faith. Personally -- and here I am speaking more as a theologian and not as prefect of the congregation -- I would abandon it, since it was only a theological hypothesis. "It formed part of a secondary thesis in support of a truth which is absolutely of first significance for faith, namely, the importance of baptism," he said. In "God and the World," published in 2000, Ratzinger said limbo had been used "to justify the necessity of baptizing infants as early as possible" to ensure that they had the "sanctifying grace" needed to wash away the effects of original sin.
When Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI he reiterated his views. His statement on April 20, 2007 launched a theological bombshell.
After 1,500 years, the Catholic Church recognized that the necessity of baptism was inextricably linked to the universality of the curse inherited from Adam. The implications on Christian theology in breaking the link were profound.
Catholic apostles of the Gospel of Wrath were quick to denounce the pronouncement as a heresy that perverted traditional Christian teaching. The website below draws its authority from the Council of Carthage which was organized by Augustine to impose Original Sin as Christian orthodoxy.
Pope St. Zosimus, The Council of Carthage, Canon on Sin and Grace, 417 A.D.- “It has been decided likewise that if anyone says that for this reason the Lord said: ‘In my Father’s house there are many mansions’ [John 14:2]: that it might be understood that in the kingdom of heaven there will be some middle place or some place anywhere where the blessed infants live who departed from this life without baptism, without which they cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven, which is life eternal, let him be anathema.” (Denz. 102, authentic addition to canon 2.)
These defenders of Limbo, who condemn Pope Benedict for contradicting a literal interpretation of Original Sin, fail to recognize that the compromise doctrine of Limbo which they defend so fiercely is equally heretical. Limbo is precisely the ‘middle place’ that Augustine refused to permit. His campaign of mass conversion required that parents be presented with stark choice between baptism/heaven or non-baptism/hell. Limbo was a subsequent compromise, justified by higher principals of divine justice and mercy. The abolition of Limbo can be justified by the same higher principals. Protestants adopted this theological position early in the Reformation.
Finally, after 1,500 years, most Catholics and Protestants are in agreement that Limbo was a theological fiction necessitated by a narrow and ugly interpretation of Original Sin.
Has the purity of the Early Church of Jesus been restored? No. Next week we will compare the unadulterated Gospel of Love with the post-Augustinian Gospel of Wrath. The theology and its interpretation are diametrically opposed. This week let us consider the many ways in which Augustine altered Christian theology and how those innovations continue to perpetuate a Gospel of Wrath.
Infant baptism removed the essential elements of free choice and personal responsibility from salvation. Children were not ‘saved’ because of any personal choice. The subsequent sacrament of confirmation seals the covenant made in Holy Baptism. In the Roman Catholic Church, confirmation "renders the bond with the Church more perfect" because a baptized person is already a full member of the Church. The Salvation secured by infant baptism is never questioned unless the adult specifically renounces the Christian faith and rejects baptism. The only real exercise of will is a negative one. It has always been a comfort for Christians that they and their children were secure in their salvation inside the Church.
The corollary was the unfortunate doctrine: Outside the Church, No Salvation. Outside the Church meant outside baptism. Augustine enforced this in the most rigorous and brutal manner possible by excluding all non-Christians. This was not a major problem during the first centuries following the introduction of Original Sin. The barbarians in China and sub-Saharan Africa were too remote to matter and the populations of the Americas and Australia were unknown.
The doctrine ‘Outside the Church: No Salvation’ goes to the heart of centuries of persecution of Jews who preferred to retain the faith of their fathers. Old Testament Patriarchs such as Enoch, Abraham, Moses, Job, and David presented a particular problem to this doctrine of Original Sin. How was it possible that Jews of the Roman Empire were condemned while Old Testament Patriarchs were held up as heroes of the faith? This thorny paradox was resolved by creating a special section of Limbo (Limbus Patrum) for righteous people who died before the incarnation of Christ. Their section of Limbo, unlike the Limbo for unbaptized babies, was temporary and abolished the moment the resurrected Jesus opened the gates of Heaven. It was still never fully clear why Old Testament Jews were saved while New Testament Jews were condemned but living Jews could ensure their salvation by converting to Christianity.
Christian theology has never resolved the problem of universal condemnation incurred via Original Sin. Catholic theologians have argued that in some mysterious and inexplicable way it is possible for God to grant salvation to righteous Jews, Pagans and Savages even if they never accepted Jesus as their Saviour and never received baptism. The Protestant Reformation took the opposite approach. Rather than seek loopholes in the Gospel of Wrath to accommodate divine love and justice, Luther and Calvin restored the full power and ugliness of Original Sin. They declared that humans had become so totally depraved that the natural human state is slavery to sin and enmity to God. Therefore only an elect few could be saved and not through any merit of their own. God alone, through grace alone, would save the elect few whose salvation had been predestined from the dawn of time. Luther and Calvin saw no injustice in total depravity and predestination which eliminated every trace of freewill from the process of salvation. Divine justice was demonstrated by punishing sin, and divine love was demonstrated by extending saving grace to the undeserving elect.
The Reformation polarized Christians. Catholics accused Protestants of renouncing their salvation by defecting ‘outside the Church’ while Protestants accused Catholics of following the antichrist (Popes) who had introduced heretical doctrine such as Limbo, Purgatory and Indulgences. The conflict escalated into bloody religious wars (notably 1618-48) that killed millions of Catholics and Protestants.
It would be hard to determine whether the forced conversions and genocides perpetrated by the Catholic Conquistadors was worse than Imperial atrocities committed by the Protestant British, Dutch and Germans. The great horrors of Christian history can be traced to the Gospel of Wrath which regards the natural born unsaved sinner as the enemy of God. The only hope of salvation is conversion. Freewill was not a necessary factor because the unsaved sinner was incapable of recognizing or choosing the things of God.
Augustine devoted decades of his life to fighting the heresy of freewill as articulated by Pelagius, who became the father of Pelagianism. Protestant Reformers the fought the heresy of freewill as articulated by James Arminius, who became the father of Arminanism.
Modern notions of freewill and personal responsibility were defended by people like John Wesley, who was pushed out of the Church of England and obliged to found a new denomination called Methodists. Wesley’s views on freewill would profoundly impact Christian theology in the 19th and 20th centuries. However Wesley also defended Original Sin, and wrote an entire book on the subject. Wesley was a transitional figure who agreed with Augustine, Luther and Calvin that Original Sin justified universal condemnation but he disagreed with Luther and Calvin that the damaged will was totally depraved. Wesley believed we are all endowed with sufficient grace to freely choose salvation.
Wesley’s Methodists in the 18th century gave rise to the Holiness Movement in the 19th century which gave birth to many forms of Evangelicals, Pentecostals and Charismatics in the 20th century. Most of these modern Protestants agree with John Wesley that sinners are endowed with sufficient grace to personally accept or reject salvation.
The most renowned and influential Christian Evangelist of the 20th century was Billy Graham. For 50 years Billy Graham preached a simple gospel of sin and salvation. He was criticised because the script of his sermons never changed. He replied, ‘Why would eternal truth change?’ The clip below from a 1958 Gospel Crusade is a perfect example of Billy Graham’s salvation message.
Billy Graham grew up in a Protestant world that considered all non-Christians to be condemned. Many Protestants continued to condemn Catholics as unsaved. Billy Graham preached the Gospel to billions and may have successfully evangelised millions. It is unlikely that a single preacher ever converted so many sinners. But Billy Graham realized the millions he had reached were a tiny percentage of the world’s population and an even tinier percentage of all the people who had ever lived in past generations.
The paradox of Original Sin began to trouble Billy Graham. If each sinner needs Jesus Christ as his personal Saviour, what happened to the multitudes who never heard the Gospel message? Was Augustine right that outside the Church there was no salvation? Was Luther right that all those people were so totally depraved that they deserved nothing but eternal damnation? Was Calvin right that God had predestined their damnation ‘for His own pleasure?’
Eventually Billy Graham could not recognize the love of justice of the God he knew with the ugliness of original sin. He became convinced that God’s grace must be large enough to embrace the entire world. Billy Graham was no theologian, so he could not explain how it worked, but he believed in his heart that it must be true. He first publically announced his new belief in 1997 on Robert Schuller’s TV program.
(Transcript of "The Hour of Power" TV program May 23, 1997.)
Schuller: "Tell me, what is the future of Christianity?"
Billy Graham: "Well, Christianity and being a true believer, you know, I think there's the body of Christ which comes from all the Christian groups around the world, or outside the Christian groups. I think that everybody that loves Christ or knows Christ, whether they're conscious of it or not, they're members of the body of Christ. And I don't think that we're going to see a great sweeping revival that will turn the whole world to Christ at any time. What God is doing today is calling people out of the world for His name. Whether they come from the Muslim world, or the Buddhist world, or the Christian world, or the non-believing world, they are members of the body of Christ because they've been called by God. They may not even know the name of Jesus, but they know in their hearts they need something that they don't have and they turn to the only light they have and I think they're saved and they're going to be with us in heaven."
Schuller: "Tell me, what is the future of Christianity?"
Billy Graham: "Well, Christianity and being a true believer, you know, I think there's the body of Christ which comes from all the Christian groups around the world, or outside the Christian groups. I think that everybody that loves Christ or knows Christ, whether they're conscious of it or not, they're members of the body of Christ. And I don't think that we're going to see a great sweeping revival that will turn the whole world to Christ at any time. What God is doing today is calling people out of the world for His name. Whether they come from the Muslim world, or the Buddhist world, or the Christian world, or the non-believing world, they are members of the body of Christ because they've been called by God. They may not even know the name of Jesus, but they know in their hearts they need something that they don't have and they turn to the only light they have and I think they're saved and they're going to be with us in heaven."
Schuller: "What I hear you saying is that it's possible for Jesus Christ to come into a human heart and soul and life even if they've been born in darkness and have never had exposure to the Bible. Is that a correct interpretation of what you're saying?"
Graham: "Yes it is because I believe that. I've met people in various parts of the world in tribal situations that they have never seen a Bible or heard about a Bible, have never heard of Jesus but they've believed in their hearts that there is a God and they tried to live a life that was quite apart from the surrounding community in which they lived."
Schuller: "This is fantastic. I'm so thrilled to hear you say that. There's a wideness in God's mercy.
Graham: There is. There definitely is."
See the interview here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axxlXy6bLH0&NR=1
For fifty years Billy Graham preached God’s unconditional love (exemplified in the altar call hymn Just As I Am) and the free offer of salvation. But what about the multitudes of people who never heard of Jesus? What about people who believed in their hearts that there is a God but had been exposed to different religions? What about people who sought to serve God to the best of their knowledge and ability?
Billy Graham’s simple answer. "Whether they come from the Muslim world, or the Buddhist world, or the Christian world, or the non-believing world, they are members of the body of Christ because they've been called by God... I think they're saved and they're going to be with us in heaven."
Ordinary Christians found nothing shocking in Billy Graham’s comments. Many of them simply agreed. Apostles of Augustine, Luther and Calvin were outraged. Their God saves only Christians, and only a narrow subset of Christians who are scrupulously orthodox. Billy Graham, the greatest evangelist of his age was denounced as an apostate and demonized as the antichrist.
This condemnation of Billy Graham can be attributed to the lunatic fringe of Christianity but prominent, respected Christian leaders such as John MacArthur have criticized Billy Graham and all others – such as Pope Benedict – who believe that God’s mercy is inclusive and far greater than the ‘traditional’ narrow interpretation of Original Sin.
This brings us to the modern world. Many Christians - Catholics and Protestants - have recognized serious flaws in Augustine’s ugly doctrine of Original Sin, but the entire edifice of Christian theology is built on a foundation of Original Sin. It is far easier to argue that Pope Benedict and Billy Graham are heretics than to argue against ‘tradition’ because no systematic alternative theology has yet been articulated. To find a coherent alternative, we need to return to the Early Church prior to Augustine. This we will do next week.
Questions or comments? http://www.believers-dilemma.org/
Tags: Augustine, The City of God, Edward Gibbon, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Joseph Ratzinger, The Ratzinger Report, God and the World, Pope Benedict XVI, Pope St. Zosimus, the Council of Carthage, most holy family monastery, baptism, confirmation, Outside the Church No Salvation, Enoch, Abraham, Moses, Job, and David, Limbo, Limbus Patrum, Purgatory, Pelagius, James Arminius, John Wesley, Billy Graham, Robert Schuller, John MacArthur.
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