Is there Any Possibility of Reconciliation between Erasmus and Luther?

2021 ◽  
pp. 172-187
Author(s):  
Miikka Ruokanen
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Three Dimensions ◽  
Real Point ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Cross Of Christ ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Catholic Tradition ◽  
God's Grace

After five centuries, would it be possible to see any chance of reconciliation between Erasmus and Luther? Looking at this question from the point of view of the three dimensions of the doctrine of grace, we might say some hopeful words. As to the first (1) dimension of grace, at many points even Erasmus admits that human choice must be empowered by God’s grace in order to move in the direction willed by God. But here the real difference is that, for Erasmus, free choice is enabled by the grace given in the creation and it is still naturally efficient in the sinners, whereas Luther sees that there is no freedom because of the human being’s enslavement by unfaith —there is a need for the efficient prevenient movement of the Holy Spirit which alone can create faith. As to the second (2) dimension of grace, following the Catholic tradition, Erasmus knows the conception of (2a) the forensic-juridical forgiveness of sins based on the atonement by the cross of Christ—in this respect there is no real point of controversy between the two. But Erasmus knows nothing about (2b) the union of the sinner with Christ in the Holy Spirit, the Trinitarian participatory conception of justification, central for Luther. In respect to the third (3) dimension of grace, both see possible the cooperation of the believer with God, the difference being Erasmus’ more anthropocentric concept of sanctification if compared with Luther’s emphasis of growth in love enabled by the Holy Spirit.

Tradition

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald O’Collins, SJ
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Vatican Ii ◽  
World Council Of Churches ◽  
Christian Life ◽  
Joint Declaration ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
World Council ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Roman Catholics

This book opens by establishing the substantial convergence in reflection on Christian tradition proposed by a 1963 report of the Faith and Order Commission (of the World Council of Churches) and the teaching of Vatican II (1962–5). Despite this ecumenical consensus, in recent years few theologians have written about tradition, and none has looked to the social sciences for insights into the nature and functions of tradition. Drawing above all on sociologists, this work shows the difference that tradition makes in human and religious life. In the light of the divine self-revelation that climaxed with Jesus Christ, the central characteristics of tradition are set out: in particular, its relationship to and distinction from culture. The risen Christ himself is the central Tradition (upper case) at the heart of Christian life. All the baptized faithful, and not merely their ordained leaders, play a role in transmitting tradition. The ‘sense of the faithful’ amounts to a ‘sense of the tradition’. The essential, if invisible, agent of tradition remains always the Holy Spirit. Scripture and tradition function in mutual dependence, as shown by the emergence of the creeds, the image of Christ as the New Adam, and the doctrine of justification (on which a 1999 joint declaration shows substantial agreement now reached by Lutherans, Roman Catholics, and others). The full context of Christian life and history focuses the relationship between Scripture and tradition. The book deals with the challenge of discerning and reforming particular traditions. A closing appendix shows how modern studies of memory—above all, collective memory—can illuminate ways in which tradition works to maintain Christian identity and continuity.

Charops and Roman Policy in Epirus

1945 ◽  
Vol 35 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 58-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
H. H. Scullard
Keyword(s):  
Point Of View ◽  
Territorial Aggression ◽  
The Third ◽  
Individual Point ◽  
The Difference ◽  
Of Greece

In the settlement of Greece after the Third Macedonian War Roman policy was at times moderate, at times harsh. On occasion the difference might represent only an individual point of view: thus the terms imposed upon Macedonia might seem generous to a Roman who contemplated the grant of ‘freedom’ to the Macedonians, the reduction of taxation and the absence of territorial aggression on Rome's part, while they might equally seem harsh to a Macedonian who felt that his sense of nationhood had been violated by Rome's creation of the four independent Republics. But towards Epirus Roman policy seems to have been marked by two successive stages, the first moderate, the second brutal. It is the purpose of this note to attempt to consider the causes which determined this change and to examine what influence the Epirote Charops exercised upon the measures which turned his country into a playground for Roman brutality and ultimately into an abomination of desolation.

Yahweh, Women, and the Trinity

1975 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 234-242
Author(s):  
Jay G. Williams
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
New Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
The Church ◽  
The Trinity

“Might it not be possible, just at this moment when the fortunes of the church seem to be at low ebb, that we may be entering a new age, an age in which the Holy Spirit will become far more central to the faith, an age when the third person of the Trinity will reveal to us more fully who she is?”

From Seeker to Finder: A Study in Seventeenth-Century English Spiritualism Before The Quakers

1948 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 299-315 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Arthur Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Seventeenth Century ◽  
Civil Wars ◽  
Small Groups ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
British History ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Third Person ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
The Trinity

The period of the Civil Wars and Commonwealth in England was one of the most momentous epochs in British history. For small groups of people the decade of the 1640's inaugurated a New Age—an age in which the Holy Spirit reigned triumphant. Such believers reached the zenith of Puritan “spiritualism,” or that movement which placed the greatest emphasis upon the Third Person of the Trinity.

scholarly journals God’s Love in the Teaching of Cardinal Stefan Wyszyński

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 29-47
Author(s):  
Sylwester Jaśkiewicz
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Inner Life ◽  
Son Of God ◽  
The Third ◽  
God's Love ◽  
Triune God ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Theological Thought

The article presents the subject of God’s love in Cardinal Wyszyński’s teaching. Primate Wyszyński puts God’s love at the very center of his theological thought. The theme of God’s love is discussed in seven sections: the first of them refers to the most famous words of Saint John’s “Deus Caritas est” (1 Jn 4:8,16), which are a short and brief definition of God; the second section develops Cardinal Wyszyński’s statement that there was a “time” in which only Love existed; the third section concerns the impartation of God’s love; fourth section describes the love of the Father; fifth section speaks of the greatest Love, which is the Incarnate Son of God, Jesus Christ; section six focuses on the Holy Spirit, who is the Spirit of Love; the last section speaks of Mary, Mother of Beautiful Love. The whole ends with the summary. In his teachings on the love of God, Cardinal Wyszyński started with the inner life of the Triune God, with the Person of the Father, and then focuses on the salvific mission of the Son of God and the sanctifying action of the Holy Spirit. In this way, he appreciates both the category of God the Father and God as a Father full of love.

The Sacrament of Confession as a Spiritual Event in the Lives of Children and Youth

2019 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 366-376
Author(s):  
Leontin Popescu
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Children And Youth ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Good Opportunity ◽  
Personal Connection ◽  
Pastoral Identity ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
God's Grace ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

The Holy Sacraments are works seen, established by Christ the Saviour and entrusted to the Church, by means of which they bestow the grace of the Holy Spirit upon the believer. The sacrament is Christ through His ministers: bishops and priests. The necessity of the Holy Sacraments is undeniable, as they communicate God’s grace, which is the compulsory condition for redemption. The Sacrament of Confession is required by the condition of our life in this world, subject to sin and error of all sorts. We particularly tackle the Sacrament of Confession (of Confession or of Penitence), because it represents the most efficient way of individual catechization, being the Sacrament through which man re-news himself, as it serves to practically re-build the connection between God’s grace and man. Rightfully so, this Holy Sacrament has always been considered as “a good opportunity for individual pastoral identity”. Sitting in the confession chair, the priest or the bishop is not only a sacramental manager, but also “a teacher, an educator and a guide in the lives of the believers” of all ages. Beside its sacramental-therapeutical value, the educational-catechized and formative value of confession is indisputable. That is why confession has been regarded as anefficient means and a good opportunity for individual catechization, which is part of the priest’s activity, providing the chance for a real and honest dialogue, from man to man, between confessor and believer of any age. With children, confession will not be a substitute for the advice of professors or parents, or for school education, but it will have its well-defined role in the child’s life as a beginning of self-awareness. The child’s individual confession is a unique opportunity to cement a lasting personal connection, from man to man, from man to God, where the child can open up spiritually with all his problems, without the stress caused by the relationship professor-student, parent-son.

Joachimist Influences on the Idea of a Last World Emperor

Traditio ◽  
1961 ◽  
Vol 17 ◽  
pp. 323-370 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marjorie Reeves
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Time Process ◽  
Third Age ◽  
The Third ◽  
Last Judgment ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Christian Thought ◽  
Full Force

The question of the dramatis personae in the last great act of history was a subject of perennial interest in the Middle Ages. Parts, both good and bad, had to be cast and it is not surprising that national hopes and rivalries frequently crept into the various attempts to assign these tremendous cosmic roles. Although both the pessimistic expectation of a mounting crescendo of evil and the hope of a millennium had existed in Christian thought since its beginning, it was the Joachimist structure of history which most clearly brought together the final crisis of evil and the final blessedness in a last great act which was yet within history, separated from eternity by the Second Advent. The concept of an age of blessedness had three strands in it: first, the idea of the millennium, derived from the Apocalypse (20.1–3), in which Satan is bound for a thousand years; secondly, the concept of a Sabbath Age, symbolized in the Seventh Day of Creation when God rested from His labors; thirdly, the Trinitarian interpretation of history, finally worked out by Joachim, in which history was expected to culminate in the Third Age of the Holy Spirit. The first two ideas did not necessarily lead to the expectation of a last age of blessedness within time: the millennium was frequently interpreted as covering the whole period between the First and Second Advents, or again, as constituting a rule of Christ and His Saints beyond history; the Sabbath Age could be seen as a Sabbath beyond the Second Advent and Last Judgment and therefore also beyond history. It was only when these two concepts became linked with the Trinitarian view of history that they clearly symbolized a crowning age of history, set in the future and therefore not yet attained, whilst unmistakably within the time process, preceding the winding-up of history in the Second Advent and Last Judgment. The full force of Joachim's concept of the Third Age was rarely grasped, appearing usually in a much-debased form, but the program of Last Things, as worked out by Joachites of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, profoundly influenced the form which these expectations took in the later Middle Ages and, indeed, right down to the end of the sixteenth century.

The Authority of the Holy Spirit

1967 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-197
Author(s):  
H. F. Woodhouse
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Christian Theology ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Constitutive Principle ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Inner Light ◽  
The Church

What is the ultimate seat of authority to which Christian theology makes its appeal?' Dr Whale in posing this question says that answers fall into three great and distinctive types. ‘The first type emphasises the authority of the Church’ while ‘the second type emphasises the sole authority of the Bible’ and ‘the third type may be loosely described as mystical—its constitutive principle is the “Inner Light”'.1

The Psychology of the Spirit and Oepke Noordmans

2009 ◽  
Vol 3 (3) ◽  
pp. 307-320
Author(s):  
Johann Theron
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
Cross Of Christ ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Critical Anthropology ◽  
Society Today

AbstractOepke Noordmans, the Dutch theologian, has described the Holy Spirit as interpreter and comforter. This chapter explores Noordmans' critical anthropology by showing how the Spirit's interpretation of the cross of Christ to comfort mankind critically challenges the positive humanistic anthropology in our society today. Sin cannot be scientifically explained, but expresses mankind's relationship to God. Kierkegaard, Dostoyevsky, and Kohlbrugge contribute to the discussion.

Spirit-Baptism and Pentecostalism

1970 ◽  
Vol 23 (4) ◽  
pp. 397-407 ◽  
Author(s):  
James D. G. Dunn
Keyword(s):  
Holy Spirit ◽  
Great Weight ◽  
Spirit Baptism ◽  
Distinct Event ◽  
The Gift ◽  
The Holy Spirit ◽  
History Of ◽  
Christian Thought ◽  
Catholic Tradition ◽  
Two Stages

Within Christianity down through the centuries there has always been a strain of teaching which holds that salvation, so far as it may be known in this life, is experienced in two stages: first the event of becoming a Christian; then, as a later and distinct event, some special and distinctive operation or gift of the Holy Spirit. In the history of Christian thought this disjointedness was first clearly formulated in the Catholic sacraments of Baptism and Confirmation. According to A. J. Macdonald, the idea that Confirmation confers the gift of the Spirit was held without question until the time of Wyclif. And today in anglo-catholic tradition, although the episcopal laying on of hands is commonly thought of as bestowing a strengthening gift of the Spirit, some continue to speak as though the Spirit is first received at that time. Indeed, since the question was reopened by F. W. Puller in 1880, it has been regularly argued, often with great weight, though not infrequently with greater ingenuity, that far greater significance (in terms of the Spirit) should be attributed to Confirmation than to Baptism.

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