9 Comments

Another thoughtful article. I’ve come to stop using Orthodox. I prefer the Creedal Apostolic. I believe what the Apostles believed and I follow Christ as the Apostles did.

This also reminds me of the woman who had decided to join the Eastern Orthodox Church. At the end. Of the process she asked her priest, “If I join do I have to believe in the Virgin Birth?”

The priest responded, “My goodness, of course you don’t have to believe in the Virgin birth!” Then he added, as a member of Christ’s Church, you GET to believe in the Virgin Birth. It is God’s Gift to you.” I’ve used this often to share with new comers real inclusiveness.

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Thanks so much, Dean Martin. I do like the switch from "have to" rather than "get to" - it's a helpful way of reframing it!

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This was very useful, if for no other reason than how our own rather Reformed congregation is seeking to work out what "inclusive orthodoxy" could mean. Thank you.

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I'm so glad to hear it was helpful!

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A wonderful article. I started a successful online community server for Anglicans and other Protestants with the purpose of inclusive orthodoxy. We have allies, same sex couples, and trans members who are so passionately on fire for the truth of the Gospel that they actually take serious offense to the "allies" that seek to undermine Christ while trying to lift them up. What they want is robust, orthodox Christianity(usually through Anglicanism or another magisterial Reformed Church), while also being included, and loved, and held to the same basic sexual ethic standards of self control and monogamy with who they love regardless of gender.

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Thank you so much, Jeremy! And oh, that's so inspiring - thanks for sharing!

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This past week I have attended an CoE congregation on the continent. It was small, but the the somewhat over-the-top high church liturgy was interspersed with the pastor's constant acclamations "Christ is risen" in random part of the liturgy. The sermon was not well put together but it was lovely (meaning: full of love) and powerful, as he clearly believed that Christ wishes to have communion with him: real, physical communion just like he rose in flesh. It was a powerful echo of Thomas' "My lord and my God!" 2000 years later, by a preacher/minister whose hope was in the Word Made Flesh.

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Very interesting. As a non-progressive observing the progressive mainline from the outside, it often seems to me that progressive clergy are *very* creedal about the "progressive creed" and take the question of "Black Lives Matter vs All Lives Matter vs It's Ok To Be White" as seriously as other Christians take the filioque or the homoiousios. Could one really thrive in the mainline if one affirmed "Make America Great Again" or "Men Can't Become Women"? I think that, to adapt Conquest, all folx is creedal about what xe knows best.

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Yes, this is a related question -- is there a implicit orthodoxy in mainline denominations that is functioning sociologically in the way that Watson describes? I think there might be to some extent. And another argument in favor of a credally-normed orthodoxy (although one that does not depend on the truth of the creeds) is that it is generally better to have explicit rather than implicit boundaries/conditions of belonging/etc.

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