THE
POSITION OF CHRISTIAN CLERGY
The Vows of Christians in their Baptism and Confirmation affirm adherence to the Holy Word of God (The Bible) and to the interpretations of that Word of God as contained in the Traditional Creeds of the Church. No room is, therefore, left for the developing of one’s own faith principles outside of those intended by the Holy Spirit in His causing (inspiring) the writing of those Scriptures.
Clergy in
the Catholic Churches are required, at their Ordination, to sign adherence to
the Bible as BEING the Word of God and the Traditional Christina Creeds
(Apostles’ Creed, Nicene Creed, and Athanasian Creed). Clergy in the Anglican
Tradition also sign their concurrence and adherence to the Thirty-nine Articles
of Faith. Further, these Clergy affirm obedience to those placed over them in
the hierarchy in Christ.
Of course, the prime vow in all of this is that to maintain the faith of Jesus Christ as presented in the Holy Word of God and defined by the Traditional Creeds. Nothing can be seen as binding that is outside of, or contradicts, the Holy Scripture.
In an ideal circumstance, this should be an affirming situation within the Church. However, in today’s world where much of the Church hierarchy together with its institutions of theology have often concurred with the wisdom of the world juxtaposed to the Wisdom of God in the Holy Bible, a considerable conflict can exist leading the Clergy who are seriously committed to their Ordination Vows in a quandary. Those who hold to the Bible as BEING the Word of God are often condemned by the “liberal” establishment as being fundamentalist (the term to them is a “dirty” word), unlearned, superstitious, primitive, simplistic, etc. In some ecclesiastical situations those who are “foolish” enough to hold such views are actively “moved out” by the liberal establishment.
However, the tirade and often-vehement condemnation of such Clergy is to be seen, in reality, as a self-judgment of those who have abandoned the Bible as BEING the Word of God. Such persons are active in the “modern” efforts to reinterpret God’s Word for today. They participate in revisionist processes to restate “God’s Word” as “He would have written it” for today. Or they participate in weak efforts to “critically” examine the Bible to “find what is truly God’s Word” and what can be eliminated as Word of God. An example of the latter would be the process of Rudolf Bultmann who “critically determined” that the words of Jesus were only truly His if they were diametrically opposed to current Jewish polity, and eschatological in nature, and would have had Him crucified. The emphasis was on the AND relationship which reduced the so-called red-letter words (words of Jesus) to around 3% of their original content. And then he cast doubt upon the remainder as being unreliable. The Graff-Wellhausen Theories had a similar effect upon the Torah. The problem is that these people know, deep down, that holding to such theories places them in a position of dishonesty in relationship to their ordination vows. Thus, they need to react with anger to those who refute or refuse to accept such aberrations against the Holy Word of God.
In any field of endeavour in the world where a person gains a position upon the statement of any specific belief or adherence and then refutes that belief or adherence the honourable thing to do is to relinquish the position and join a body that holds to the newfound forms of belief or thought. An honourable cleric who could no longer hold to the belief structure to which he/she vowed at ordination would relinquish such orders and perform his/her further work outside of that environment.
The problem is that these individuals often hold their “authority” or perceived authority because of the title they hold. To relinquish the title would remove them from the public eye. So they convince themselves that they are not violating their faith by refuting the claims of Holy Scripture or the teachings of the Traditional Creeds to which they vowed at their undertaking of their work as a cleric.
And to make matters worse, while holding their right to violate their own vows of adherence to the basic tenets of Christianity in which they were ordained, they then begin to vehemently condemn anyone who has the audacity to place their vows to the Word of God over and above their vows to obedience to themselves despite their own refutation of that which they committed themselves to in their ordination.
The sad point is that these individuals have rendered themselves unable to be honest to themselves let alone to that which they promised at their ordination. They do not have the courage of their convictions that would require them to relinquish that to which they can no longer concur. There exists a pharisaic need to hold onto the authority (bogus as it has now become) and to hold the places of recognition (invalid as they now are in reality) rather than to do the honourable thing and step down in order to undertake what they perceive as their work within an environment that is conducive to such heretical teachings.
This means that those who are faithful to the vows they made at Ordination are placed under the pressure of remaining faithful to their vows in a situation that can often be oppressive and full of conflict that the Church does not need. After all, the Church has become a laughing stock to the world. They see the Church visibly condescending to that which the world itself instinctively knows to be against the Creative Purpose of God. As they see these “liberal” leaders trying to make friends with the world as opposed to that under which they were ordained the members of secular society stand in amusement at the propensity for corruption that this so-called bastion of faith is exhibiting. It is no wonder that those who are faithful to the teachings of Almighty God in His Divinely Inspired Word have such a difficult time presenting the true Word of God to a world dying in sin.
The “liberal” school, of course, deems such obedience to what they would deem to be fundamentalist (the term to them is a “dirty” word), unlearned, superstitious, primitive, simplistic, etc. as being divisive. They claim that such attitudes will cause division within the Church. The whole fault, in their book, is seen to be those who are being faithful to that which they committed – which seems to be an oxymoron in itself. Those who are being disobedient to God in their ordination vows are blaming those who are being faithful to what they vowed as being the cause of the problem.
But, those who are faithful to their vows have no option. St. Peter and St. John asked the Sanhedrin, “Whom should we obey? You or God!” So the faithful clergy along with the faithful parishioners are put in a place whereby they have to ask the same question in standing against the secular society and the “liberal” hierarchy within the Church.
Again, obedience is the key concept. And the primary obedience, contrary to the thought structure of those who are drunk with their perception of power and authority – even authority to change God’s Word, is to Almighty God as He has revealed Himself to the world in His Living (Jesus) and Written (The Holy Bible) Word. All authority is to be followed save where it would tend to lead against God and His Divine Word. Here the no-brainer is that God is to be obeyed above all else.