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Calvin on Unity and
Sexual Immorality
A Comment on a
Presbyterian Coalition Document
by Robert A. J.
Gagnon
Aug. 13, 2007
For a print copy use the
PDF version here.
In a new Presbyterian
Coalition paper, “Let
Us Rise Up and Build (Neh. 2:18): A Plan for Reformation in the
Presbyterian Church (USA),” which I commend as a continuing effort to
bring renewal to the PCUSA, Calvin is cited on the question of unity and
the case of Corinth:
John Calvin, in his Institutes of the Christian Religion (Book
IV, Chapter 1), recites the long history of doctrinal and moral
corruption in Israel and the church. He refers to the church in
Corinth, where “it was not a few that erred, but almost the whole body
had become tainted; there was not one species of sin but a multitude;
and these not trivial errors, but some of them execrable crimes”
(section 14). Calvin notes that “Paul, instead of giving them [the
Corinthian Christians] over to destruction, mercifully extricated
them” (section 27). The reformer concludes, “Such, then, is the
holiness of the Church: it makes daily progress, but is not yet
perfect; it daily advances, but as yet has not reached the goal”
(section 17). Our hope is that “the Lord is daily smoothing its [the
Church’s] wrinkles, and wiping away its spots” (section 2). (p. 5 n.
1)
These references buttress
the assertion on p. 2 that “the church always stands in need of
reformation” and justify staying in the denomination despite its problems.
The comment is made on p. 4: “Even individuals and congregations that move
to another Reformed body will soon discover that that body, too, stands in
need of biblical reformation.” In short, these remarks suggest that
affirmation of homosexual unions in the PCUSA would not be grounds for
leaving the PCUSA.
In response:
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It is not clear to me that Calvin
intended to say, in the
quotations given above, that believers should remain in a
denominational structure indefinitely that blessed incestuous unions
between a man and his mother or stepmother, among church officers no
less, and did so as part of the doctrine of the church.
Indeed, it strikes me as historically bizarre to suggest that
Calvin would long have remained in such a denomination as prospects
dimmed for turning the denomination around. The only question, it seems
to me, is whether Calvin would have recommended to civil authorities
beheading or banishment for offenders. The same question would have
applied, indeed more so, to the case of homosexual offenders. (Here, of
course, I do not wish to condone either fate but merely suggest that the
intensity of Calvin’s opposition would have been greater, not lesser,
than ours.)
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Calvin’s remarks have to be taken in
context. First, he appears to presume a realistic possibility of
repentance on the part of offenders. Hence his remark in Book
IV, ch. 1, sec. 27 (all further references to sections are to Book IV,
ch. 1, unless otherwise noted): “Nay, the very persons who had sinned .
. . are expressly invited to repentance.” This is exactly Paul’s
expectation in 1 Cor 5. Paul has only just received news of the case of
the incestuous man (5:1) and still expects to be able to have an effect
on the community. He orders them “in the name of our Lord Jesus . . . to
hand over such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh” (5:4-5),
meaning, minimally, that they are not to associate with the offender,
“not even to eat together with such a one” (5:9-11). As founder of the
community and as supreme apostle to the Gentiles, he feels that he has a
reasonable expectation of succeeding in his order. Indeed, it is
possible that the reference to restoring quickly a penitent
offender in 2 Cor 2:5-10 (cf. 7:8-13) alludes to the incestuous man,
with whom Paul may have ‘had it out’ in an intervening visit to Corinth.
But Paul also speaks of ongoing “sexual uncleanness, sexual immorality,
and sexual licentiousness” that the Corinthians have not repented of,
which puts them at risk of not inheriting God’s kingdom (2 Cor 12:21;
cf. 1 Cor 6:9-10). Such conduct may necessitate a harsh visit by Paul,
with ultimatum (2 Cor 13:1-10; cf. 1 Cor 4:18-21).
The situation with the incestuous man that Paul faced at
the time that he wrote we today call “1 Corinthians,” is very different
from a situation extending over decades in which the Corinthians would
have not only adamantly refused to submit to Paul’s ruling but also
installed the incestuous man as a leader of the church and where
reconciliation with the teaching of “our Lord Jesus” on incest (implicit
teaching, of course, since Jesus did not speak directly against man-mother
incest) no longer seemed a reasonable prospect. Under the latter set of
circumstances the continuance of the church in the Pauline orbit seems
highly unlikely, to say nothing of Paul insisting that believers must
continue to submit to the leadership of such a renegade church in the name
of “unity.” Unity for Paul was a Christological concept, not a
sociological concept—unity around the one who was crucified for us and
into whose name we were baptized (1:13) and who therefore had a right to
be Lord of our lives (5:13; 12:3).
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A second contextual factor
in Calvin’s discussion is that Calvin was primarily thinking of the
context of his own ‘denomination,’ where he exercised great
influence, and about matters of doctrine and behavior that were not
major and so did not constitute sufficient grounds for leaving the
denomination. As regards doctrine he cites the example of whether
the soul on leaving the body definitely lives with the Lord or makes no
commitment about the soul’s abode other than it goes to heaven (sec.
12). As regards behavior, he cites the case of the Anabaptists and
others who tolerate no “imperfection of conduct” and “spurn the society
of all in whom they see that something human still remains”—what Calvin
refers to as “immoderate severity” (sec. 13). He is not thinking of
institutional teaching that declares a good what God in Scripture
defines as “abhorrent.” It is doubtful that Calvin in his day could even
have conceived of the possibility of the Church’s ordaining persons who
were actively and unrepentantly engaged in homosexual practice, so
extreme would such a development have been to him. Calvin summarizes his
remarks in Book IV, ch. 1 as: “trivial errors in [the] ministry [of the
Church] ought not to make us regard it as illegitimate” and “prevent us
from giving the name of Church” (ch. 2, sec. 1).
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A third contextual factor is that
Calvin does see a place for dissolving denominational ties.
“Who may presume to give the name of Church, without reservation, to
that assembly by which the word of God is openly and with impunity
trampled under foot. . . ?” (ch. 2, sec. 7). In his own day Calvin
viewed dissolution from the Roman Catholic Church as justified by the
latter’s adoption of “superstitious worship” in connection with a
particular priestly interpretation of the Lord’s Supper. “The communion
of the Church ought not to be carried so far by the godly as to lay them
under a necessity of following it when it has degenerated to profane and
polluted rites” (ch. 2, sec. 9). The PCUSA is currently degenerating
into allowing, at least, the “profane and polluted rites” of blessing
homoerotic unions and ordaining homosexually-active officers of the
church. Calvin rightly notes that “the Church was not instituted to be a
chain to bind us in . . . impiety . . . , but rather to retain us in the
fear of God and obedience of the truth” (ch. 2, sec. 2). In severing
ourselves from churches that promote impiety, Calvin says, “we run no
risk of being dissevered from the Church of Christ” (ibid.).
Moreover, Calvin recognized the problem in staying in
a denominational structure that would require obedience to that
structure’s erroneous teaching. “We cannot concede that they have a
Church, without obliging ourselves to subjection and obedience.” He argued
that a person will “greatly err” to regard “as churches” the meetings
constituting the Roman Catholic Church, which he viewed as “contaminated
by idolatry, superstition, and impious doctrine,” since “full communion”
requires a certain degree of agreement in doctrine (ch. 2, sec. 10).
Although the PCUSA does not currently require ‘subscriptionism’ on the
validity of homosexual bonds, it does exert pressure at many different
levels to conform to this view, or at least acknowledge the credibility of
such a view, if one is to be a ‘player’ holding office on the national
and, in some cases, the synod or presbytery levels. The equation of “civil
rights” for homosexually active persons with civil rights for African
Americans and for women indicates that the current de facto local
option will not be optional over the long term. No one in the PCUSA church
today has the right to refuse candidacy to a woman or to an ethnic
minority on the grounds of being a woman or minority. The same will
eventually accrue for persons who are homosexually active. Already, in
various ways, we find ourselves in positions where we must respect and
even submit to church bodies (like the 2006 General Assembly and some
judicial bodies in the PCUSA) that are pursuing a homosexual agenda for
the church; and to respect the national leadership of a Stated Clerk, and
sometimes the Moderator, promoting the homosexual agenda and eviscerating
the plain meaning of the Book of Order on ordination standards for sexual
behavior in various subtle and not so subtle ways.
It is interesting that Calvin did not declare the
“church” from which he separated to have ceased in all respects from being
a “church.” “While we are unwilling simply to concede the name of Church
to the Papists, we do not deny that there are churches among them. But we
contend only for the true state of the Church, implying communion as well
as everything which pertains to the profession of our Christianity” (ch.
2, sec. 12).
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A fourth contextual factor is that
we live today in an inter-denominational world
where a plethora of valid Christian denominations
exist, where the differences within a given denomination are often
greater than across denominations, and where, consequently, “changing
denominations” no longer has the significance that it once had.
Today Presbyterians, Methodists, Lutherans, Episcopalians, Baptists, and
Pentecostals, to say nothing of Roman Catholics and persons belonging to
the various Orthodox churches, are by choice of denomination necessarily
“divided” from other Christians, at least in an institutional way. This
is different from the regional sway held by reformed churches of
Calvin’s day and the relatively limited array of options for going
elsewhere. When I came to Pittsburgh thirteen years ago as an American
Baptist and joined the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)—nobody in the PCUSA
accused me of violating the Scripture’s commands on church unity, even
though there were (and are) American Baptist churches in the area.
So the issue that the
renewal movements in the PCUSA must face is not whether there are
justifiable grounds for leaving a denomination but rather on what
grounds departure would be justifiable. In answering this question one
should take the following syllogism into consideration:
A
MAJOR PREMISE
A denomination renders itself illegitimate when,
through enactment, it willfully ordains persons actively involved in
adult incest, adultery, polyamory, or like acts, and blesses sexual
unions constituted by such behavior.
B MINOR PREMISE
Homosexual practice is, according to Scripture, at
least as bad as—and probably worse than—adult incest, adultery, and
polyamory.
C
CONCLUSION
A denomination renders itself illegitimate when,
through enactment, it willfully ordains homosexually active persons
and blesses homosexual unions.
When we compare the
current and soon-to-happen circumstances of the PCUSA to the problems that
will beset those who leave the PCUSA for more orthodox bodies—even if only
to make the comparison at the point of ongoing “need of biblical
reformation” (p. 4)—we do an injustice to the foundational importance that
Scripture attaches to having sexual bonds consist only of “male and
female” and, conversely, the abhorrence with which Scripture’s authors
treat homosexual practice of any sort. In short, we underestimate the
sacred importance of what is now seriously endangered in the PCUSA.
The current “Let Us Rise
Up and Build” document does the renewal movement of the PCUSA a disservice
if it does not address the elephant in the room; namely, what constitutes
legitimate grounds for departure in the PCUSA. This question is on the
minds not of those who have already left—for them it is no longer a
question. It is foremost a question for those who remain. The actions of
the General Assembly one year from now could well render the entire
strategy of this report irrelevant. We must now, and not next year, begin
to address the “what if?”
Robert A. J. Gagnon,
Ph.D. is associate professor of New Testament at Pittsburgh Theological
Seminary, an elder in the PCUSA, and a member of the Board of the
Presbyterian Coalition. He can be reached at
gagnon@pts.edu.
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