Whither TAW?

gzt said:

There are certainly some things we can admonish and reprove. In fact, the Bible gives us guidelines for how to do so, particularly in the case of a local congregation. Beyond that, it's out of your hands. Do you get the point I'm making? "What is that to you?" as somebody once said in some book.

It's also not pleasant to be accused of opening the door to the gay agenda or told that the arguments being made - though I rarely make arguments - are straight up Episcopalianism. Deal directly, we're not here to debate Episcopalianism.

EDIT: or that we would be soft on Arianism. Or heresy in general. Or that our loyalty to the Church is suspect. Or, etc - I don't seeing people told what they believe or would do.

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gzt said:

This is one of the operative phrases - I think untrained people should refrain from "teaching" without some sort of warrant for it, and people here generally do refrain. Not to mention that most people here, I would say, lack the formal elements of being able to even commit heresy.

But this goes both ways - over-strictness and laxity. Neither is a good witness of the faith.

Fatal ideas, certainly, should be rebuked, but otherwise we shouldn't be too strenuous and get out the litmus strips prematurely.

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What is a heresy, and what is the historical importance of such a
thing?

Like most modern words, "Heresy" is used both vaguely and
diversely. It is used vaguely because the modern mind is as averse to
precision in ideas as it is enamored of precision in measurement. It is
used diversely because, according to the man who uses it, it may represent
any one of fifty things.

Today, with most people (of those who use the English language),
the word "Heresy" connotes bygone and forgotten quarrels, an old prejudice against rational examination. Heresy is therefore thought to be of
no contemporary interest. Interest in it is dead, because it deals with
matter no one now takes seriously. It is understood that a man may
interest himself in a heresy from archaeological curiosity, but if he
affirm that it has been of great effect on history and still is, today,
of living contemporary moment, he will be hardly understood.

Yet the subject of heresy in general is of the highest importance
to the individual and to society, and heresy in its particular meaning
(which is that of heresy in Christian doctrine) is of special interest for
anyone who would understand Europe: the character of Europe and the story
of Europe. For the whole of that story, since the appearance of the
Christian religion, has been the story of struggle and change, mainly
preceded by, often, if not always, caused by, and certainly accompanying,
diversities of religious doctrine. In other words, "the Christian heresy"
is a special subject of the very first importance to the comprehension of
European history, because, in company with Christian orthodoxy, it is the
constant accompaniment and agent of European life.


We must begin by a definition, although definition involves a
mental effort and therefore repels.

Heresy is the dislocation of some complete and self-supporting
scheme by the introduction of a novel denial of some essential part
therein.

We mean by "a complete and self-supporting scheme" any system of
affirmation in physics or mathematics or philosophy or what-not, the
various parts of which are coherent and sustain each other.

For instance, the old scheme of physics, often called in England
"Newtonian" as having been best defined by Newton, is a scheme of this
kind. The various things asserted therein about the behaviour of matter,
notably the law of gravity, are not isolated statements any one of which
could be withdrawn at will without disarranging the rest; they are all the
parts of one conception, or unity, such that if you but modify a part the
whole scheme is put out of gear.

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gzt said:

The sin of heresy is obstinate post-baptismal denial of revealed truth. To be guilty of the sin, you must understand the doctrine, reject it, teach the contrary, and continue after correction by competent authority. No, most people are not formally capable of this sin. They can certainly believe and teach heresies and have some degree of culpability for it. But to really be a heretic, that takes something.

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