Marginal Christianity

December 26, 2014 Lessons & Carols at St. James Church on Madison Avenue. Sadly, I was not here on Christmas Eve. I WAS a visitor this year at the midnight service on Christmas Eve in a venerable, colonial-era parish here in our fair Diocese of New York. The distinguishing feature of the service, other than beautiful music, was its utter theological barrenness. There was, apart from what the layman could take for himself from the lessons (and, of course, the theology-heavy Christmas hymns), not a thing by way of instruction in “this thing which is come to pass.” Eucharistic Prayer D most certainly did not contribute any theological content, and the sermon was dead on arrival. But the first sign that something was amiss came at the end of the Old and New Testament lessons, where, omitting the customary (and very fine) The word of the Lord , the bulletin instead enjoined the congregation to Hear what the Spirit is saying to God’s people . As we have already dispatched ...

http://nblo.gs/Y3XS8 An excellent post from Scot McKnight on a review of Carl Trueman's book, The Creedal Imperative . ___ The best part of this book, other than Trueman’s occasional zingers at church goofinesses and cultural nonsense, is his chapter on the usefulness of creeds. I found this chapter to be theologically helpful but also pastorally aware (he pastors). Here are his uses of creeds: 1. All churches have creeds and confessions (I'd say they all have "theologies" but not all have "creeds" in a specialized sense). Failure to acknowledge this can be disingenuous. (I agree with that.) 2. Confessions delimit the power of the church. (I don’t like the word "delimit" but I agree with his point.) They mean the church has to answer to something above it! That's a good thing. Too many think they are the first to find something. 3. They offer succinct and thorough summaries of the central elements of the faith. Good creeds do this, bu...