Seeking an alternative ecumenism: Thomas Oden and JPII

A paper by David Schütz

Delivered at Caroline Chisholm Library, March 12, 2003

I recently had an experience which I found quite perplexing. I was invited to attend a luncheon to launch "Transforming Melbourne 2003"--an initiative of the Melbourne Pastors Network to call Christians across Melbourne to join in prayer and fasting during lent. The Pastors Network is led by the Rev. Rob Isaachsen, an evangelical Anglican priest who is an enthusiastic "networker" among the evangelical and pentecostal communities of Melbourne.

At this luncheon it was claimed that there were representatives from over 100 different churches and parachurch organisations. Just think about that. There was a representative from the Catholic Church (me). One from the Uniting Church. One from the Lutheran Church. Three or four from the Anglican Church. That leaves 96 groups unaccounted for. So who were the rest? There were representatives from the Church of Christ, Salvation Army, Baptists of various persuasions, Presbyterians (ditto), Adventists, Christian Revival Crusade, Assemblies of God, Church of the Nazarene, Reformed, Foursquare Gospel, Vineyard, and Apostolic churches, just to name a few, and a host of independent community churches and parachurch groups--all from the pentecostal and evangelical wing of the Christian spectrum. Only two of these--the Churches of Christ and the Salvation Army are members of the Victorian Council of Churches, the official ecumenical body in Victoria. We sometimes lose sight of the fact that beside the big mainline denominations, there are literally myriads of smaller bodies--often consisting of no more than one congregation--that are separate denominations in their own right, and many of these fall into one of two categories: evangelical or pentecostal.

So what was going on here? At first sight, this gathering seemed to represent the epitome of fractured disunity in the church. Yet as I heard them speak and pray together, I became aware that there was a depth of unity among these Christians that I rarely experienced among the larger Christian bodies. They shared the same prayer language, the same priorities, and, on the whole, the same beliefs. They were so close that, if it wasn't for the name tags, I wouldn't have been able to tell a Baptist from a Presbyterian, or an AOG from a Foursquare Gospeler. This experience raised questions in my mind.

Another interesting phenomena is taking place in the United States. There, a group calling itself "Evangelicals and Catholics Together" (ECT for short) has been meeting for over a decade, and has been producing joint statements of the type we are used to seeing issued from official bilateral church dialogues. This group is no lightweight. On the catholic side, it includes Cardinal Avery Dulles, Dr Peter Kreeft, Fr Richard John Neuhaus, Michael Novak and George Weigel. The evangelical side is just as well represented, with participants including Dr. Richard Mouw of Fuller Theological Seminary, Dr James J. I. Packer of Regent College, British Columbia, and a certain Dr Thomas Oden of Drew University, of whom we shall soon be hearing a great deal. This group has been discovering a shared interest in issues such as the authority of scripture, the historical veracity of the virgin birth and the resurrection, and the orthodox Trinitarian and Christological doctrines. In 1997, ECT released a statement on justification called "The Gift of Salvation”. At the time, a commentator in the major evangelical journal Christianity Today wrote:

"The Gift of Salvation" has been made possible by a major realignment in ecumenical discourse: the coalescence of believing Roman Catholics and faithful evangelicals who both affirm the substance of historic Christian orthodoxy against the ideology of theological pluralism that marks much mainline Protestant thought as well as avant-garde Catholic theology. Thus, for all our differences, Bible-believing evangelicals stand much closer to Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger than to Bishop John Spong! (Timothy George, "The Gift of Salvation: An Evangelical Assessment" CT, 8/12/97)

So again I ask: what is going on here? We have evangelical and pentecostal groups absenting themselves from the ecumenical activities of the councils of churches, yet showing a real passion for unity with one another; and we have evangelicals and catholics--traditionally poles apart theologically--issuing joint statements showing a high level of agreement on the cardinal doctrines of orthodox Christianity.

Now add to this the world wide ecumenical picture, especially from the point of view of the World Council of Churches. Neither the Roman Catholic Church nor (generally speaking) the evangelical or pentecostal churches are members of the WCC. Even on their own, the absence of any one of these groups from the ecumenical table would leave a lot of empty chairs, let alone together. But in recent years, the other great non-protestant bloc of Christian Churches has come close to leaving the table too. At the Harare meeting of the WCC in 1998--50 years after the founding of the Council--a special commission had to be set up to address issues raised by the Orthodox representatives. In fact, if these issues were not satisfactorily addressed, the Orthodox said, they would leave the Council en masse. Their concerns? According to Aram I, Catholicos of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Cilicia and moderator of the central committee of the WCC, Orthodox concerns centred on

the controversial nature and perceived irrelevance of some of the Council's programmatic activities to the life of Orthodox churches. Many of the Orthodox…have come to regard the Council as a Western, Protestant and liberal movement... Orthodox members also express discomfort with the WCC's style of decision-making, preferring dialogue and consensus to majority vote. The current style of operating is…essentially a model derived from political life and is not necessarily the best way to express the self-understanding of a ‘fellowship of churches'. (Visible Unity: Struggling Towards an Elusive Goal, WCC website)

Reading between the lines, the Orthodox are uncomfortable with the liberal agenda of the WCC (such as the ordination of women and inclusive language), and very hesitant to embrace the "unity in diversity" model of church unity, which includes joint worship and intercommunion. The whole issue is dealt with very well in a book called: Beyond the East -West Divide (on the reading list).

Not only were relationships with the Orthodox on the Harare agenda, but also the relationship of the WCC with the evangelicals. A certain American evangelical theologian, a long standing participant in World Council affairs, said that

This [was] the first time evangelicals [had] been united in coming to an assembly. The WCC has made attempts to reach out to evangelical and Pentecostal non-member churches, while often excluding the evangelicals among its members. What we're talking about are faithful Methodists, faithful Presbyterians, whose churches contribute to the WCC but who feel marginalized by some of the organization's emphases and rhetoric. (Visible Unity: Struggling Towards an Elusive Goal, WCC website)

Together with a panel of other evangelical leaders from nearly every continent, he called on the WCC to return to its original missionary purpose, and to an emphasis on the gospel message of salvation through Jesus Christ.

That theologian was Dr Thomas Oden, and after this rather lengthy introduction, I guess it is time that we turn to him and hear what he has to say. As I do, I want to acknowledge the AD2000 journal for publishing a piece by a certain Mark Tooley in its Christmas 2002 edition. The source of this piece was not acknowledged--I found it later on the internet (under its original title "Methodist theologian announces 'new ecumenism'" )--but the subject matter grabbed my attention. It dealt with a paper that was given by Oden in October 2001 entitled "The New Ecumenism and Christian Witness to Society" ( ). Reading Oden's paper I believe that I found the clue to what I had been observing in the Melbourne Pastors Network, in Evangelicals and Catholics Together, and in the World Council of Churches.

It is worth making your acquaintance with Thomas Oden. He was on my reading list when I was trained as a Lutheran pastor (in the area of pastoral ministry in the early church). His latest project is as joint editor of the Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture (published by IVP), which has been described as:

an ambitious 27-volume series that encompasses all of Old and New Testament Scripture through commentary and key writings by the early church fathers. Using contemporary computer technology, the editors are able to include from the patristic writers' vast corpus judiciously selected commentary on key passages and topics. The final goal of this ecumenical series is to create a Christian Talmud, a broad exegesis of Scripture written specifically for an interdenominational audience of lay, pastoral, and scholarly readers. (Merle Harton Jnr,

So far, 13 volumes have been published, and it is being hailed as a great success. I mention this because this patristic and interdenominational interest is essential background in understanding Oden's ecumenical thesis.

To which we now come. Unlike many evangelicals, Oden has a clear ecumenical vision. That vision is of nothing less than an "alternative ecumenism"--an alternative to the type of ecumenism we have come to know since the sixties--since Vatican II and the 1966 Geneva meeting of the World Council of Churches which set the direction for modern ecumenism. Oden sees hope in a new alliance of evangelical and pentecostal Christians with Roman Catholics and Orthodox.

In this, he immediately sets himself apart from those evangelicals who would see any such cooperation as an utter impossibility. I can name one instance very close to home. The English paper Church Times recently reported that the Sydney Anglican Archbishop, Dr Peter Jensen, told a meeting of conservative evangelicals in London:

Evangelicals must stand shoulder to shoulder, doing evangelism with those churches and denominations with whom they can co-operate “in gospel unity”. This definition, said Dr Jensen, excluded, for him personally, the Roman Catholics. He had “serious misgivings about what sacramentalist ministry does for the clarity of the gospel.” (Church Times website, )

Now Dr Jensen is far from alone in this opinion. It is the classic evangelical position vis a vis Roman Catholics. But Dr Oden claims that the goal posts have been shifted. He identifies not catholicism but liberal protestantism as the real ecumenical opposition. If pushed, even Dr Jensen would have to admit that he is discovering common ground with catholic Christians in the area of morality and ethics. At a time when many bishops of the Anglican communion are toying with the idea of ordaining practicing homosexuals, or celebrating homosexual "marriages", Dr Jensen is discovering something of an ally with his Catholic counterpart, Dr George Pell. He even personally launched the Livingstone biography of Pell in Sydney.

What common ground can evangelicals and pentecostals possibly have with catholics and orthodox? Oden believes the answer lies in the “substance of historic Christian orthodoxy”, the "common patristic heritage of the first millennium". As one reviewer expressed it, he believes in

a core, unchanging tradition that the worldwide church had consensus on, especially in the doctrine-delimiting creeds and councils."(Tim Anderson, "An appraisal of Thomas C. Oden's Postmodern Orthodoxy")

For Oden, this "ancient ecumenism" is a viable and emerging alternative to modern conciliar ecumenism. It is, he claims, nothing less than the "new ecumenism" of the 21st Century.

In his paper, Oden provides a table outlining the opposing approaches taken by "old" and "new" ecumenism respectively. I have reproduced this table for you to see on the back of the reading list. Look at the way he characterises the current ecumenical approach. It is

  • distrustful of ancient ecumenism
  • uncritically accommodating of modernity
  • oriented mainly to Enlightenment assumptions, and the Reformation’s left wing
  • revolutionary
  • preoccupied with rapid social change
  • ideologically drawn to the heirs of Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche
  • chronically activist
  • bureaucratic
  • strategically "left-leaning"
  • Utopian
  • aimed at negotiated inter-institutional unity
  • declining
  • analogous to hierarchical business organization
  • suffering a loss of nerve,
  • financially vexed
  • searching for unity in shifting political alliances
  • politics-driven
  • starting in 1948 (Amsterdam)
  • reaching its apogee in 1966 (Geneva)
  • and, by 1998 (Harare), dying.

In the light of this description of ecumenism, it is no wonder that many conservative catholics, let alone evangelicals, pentecostals and orthodox, should have a generally negative view of the ecumenical endeavour as it is currently practiced. But now look down the column that describes the new ecumenism, and tell me if it doesn’t have some appeal. The "new ecumenism" Oden is proposing is

  • deliberately grounded in ancient ecumenism
  • critical of failed modern ideas
  • oriented mainly to classic Christianity, conciliar and patristic teaching
  • characterised by an organic view of historical change
  • keenly aware of the recalcitrance of sin
  • aware of the many tragic consequences of Marx, Freud, and Nietzsche
  • patient amid historical turbulence
  • suspicious of top heavy administration
  • defensive of a free and democratic society
  • realistic
  • aimed at unity based on classic Christian truth
  • emerging
  • based on a web-networking analogy
  • confident, resourceful
  • searching for a unity already found in Christ
  • Spirit-led
  • beginning in the council of Jerusalem, 46 A.D.
  • reaching its apogee in seven Ecumenical Councils
  • still much alive

When Robert George responded to Thomas Oden's paper, he said:

As a Catholic panelist, I suppose that I am expected to say something critical, [but] I'm afraid I must disappoint this expectation." ( )

It is true that many characteristics of the "new" ecumenism are obviously in line with authentic Catholic ecumenism. Catholic teaching supports "patristic teaching" over "Reformation's left wing". It is anti-Marx, Freud and Nietzsche rather than pro-. It has an organic, long term view of church history. It would certainly trace its beginnings back to the council of Jerusalem rather than the World Council of Churches meeting in Amsterdam.

But let’s examine some of the other characteristics of Oden’s “new ecumenism”. Oden's suspicious attitude to top heavy administration rejects the bureaucracy and hierarchy of conciliar ecumenism in favour of a more democratic web-networking approach. Catholics, however suspicious they may be of bureaucracy, must affirm that hierarchy is essential to the nature of the Church. When Oden says he favours a democratic “world-wide-web” model of church cooperation, he not only rejects the business-style hierarchy embodied in Genevan ecumenism, but also the hierarchical episcopacy of the Roman church.

Oden also contrasts negotiated unity with unity based on classic Christian truth. Essentially this is due to the same suspicion of institutionalised Christianity. Later in his paper, he says that the “new ecumenism” is not about “an organisational expression of institutional union” (in Part II). In fact,

the new ecumenism hasn’t clearly decided whether or how it might engender or manifest new post-WCC expressions of the unity of the body of Christ, or whether to not focus at all on the institutional manifestation of organic unity. ("New Ecumenism", Part III)

Such a vagueness with regard to the visible unity of the church is only possible for Oden because, as an evangelical protestant, he defines the Church as an invisible entity “constituted by all who repent and believe, [all] whose lives are shaped by their participation in the living Christ, all who live in this real but imperfect communion.”

Like many catholics, evangelicals are not generally in favour of the "unity in diversity model" of ecumenism--at least when the notion of "diversity" is applied to church dogma. They believe that a high degree of doctrinal conformity is necessary for church communion. However, unlike catholics, evangelicals generally believe that such doctrinal conformity itself constitutes church unity. If party A teaches the same as party B, evangelicals would regard them as "one" even if there is no institutional expression of that relationship (such as the mutual submission of both parties to a common pastor or college of pastors). For this reason, Oden cannot entirely dismiss the positive outcomes of inter-institutional negotiated agreements. One of the few cases in which he grudgingly acknowledges that the dialogical method of ecumenism can be fruitful is in regard to the Joint Declaration on the Doctrine of Justification signed by the Vatican and the Lutheran World Federation in 1999 ("The New Ecumenism", Part IV).

It is worth pausing for a moment and asking how evangelicals define themselves. What separates them from their brothers and sisters in protestantism? In one of the earliest examinations of the question of the ecumenical relationship between catholics and evangelicals, J.W. Montgomery, an American evangelical Lutheran, defined evangelicalism as characterised by the following traits (in Ecumenicity, Evangelicals and Rome):

  1. Conviction that the Bible alone is God’s objectively inerrant revelation to man;
  2. Subscription to the Ecumenical Creeds as expressing the Trinitarian heart of biblical religion;
  3. Belief that the Reformation confessions adequately convey the soteriological essence of the scriptural message, namely, salvation by grace alone through faith in the atoning death and resurrection of the God-man Jesus Christ.
  4. Stress upon personal, dynamic, living commitment to Christ and resultant prophetic witness for him to the unbelieving world; and
  5. A strong eschatological perspective.

Since all these doctrines are classically protestant, one could call evangelicals "traditional protestants". Again, for the same reason, one would expect that they would most clearly delineate catholics from evangelicals. In fact, they more clearly delineate evangelicals from their liberal protestant brothers and sisters. Furthermore, this is a doctrinal delineation, not an institutional one. While there are individual denominations that are "evangelical" through and through, for instance the various Baptist groupings, more often evangelicals coexist with liberal protestants in denominations such as the Anglicans, Methodists, Presbyterians and Church of Christ. Now, as we know, there are liberal and conservative catholics too, but the official teaching of the magisterium is strangely more in agreement with the doctrines of the evangelicals than the opposing liberal protestant positions. For instance, Catholicism affirms that the bible is the inerrant and inspired word of God. Naturally it affirms the ancient creeds and councils. A stress upon "personal, dynamic, living commitment to Christ", the "resultant prophetic witness for him" and a "strong eschatological perspective"are certainly are not antithetical to authentic catholic faith either. And despite the fact that the Catholic Church does not view the Reformation confessions as "adequate" in any sense, yet, especially since the agreements outlined in "Gift of Salvation" and the Joint Declaration, it is more clear than ever today that the Catholic Church teaches "salvation by grace alone through faith in Christ". There are therefore great points of meeting between catholic and evangelical Christianity. One could argue that it is possible to be both at the same time.