Heresy to believe in a personal salvation

Katherine Jefferts Schiori of the ECUSA: Opening Remarks

Excerpt:

The overarching connection in all of these crises has to do with the great Western heresy – that we can be saved as individuals, that any of us alone can be in right relationship with God. It’s caricatured in some quarters by insisting that salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus. That individualist focus is a form of idolatry, for it puts me and my words in the place that only God can occupy, at the center of existence, as the ground of being. That heresy is one reason for the theme of this Convention.

Ubuntu doesn’t have any “I”s in it. The I only emerges as we connect – and that is really what the word means: I am because we are, and I can only become a whole person in relationship with others. There is no “I” without “you,” and in our context, you and I are known only as we reflect the image of the one who created us. Some of you will hear a resonance with Martin Buber’s I and Thou and recognize a harmony. You will not be wrong.

I said that this crisis has several elements related to that heretical and individualistic understanding. We’ve touched on one – how we keep this earth, meant to be a gift to all God’s creatures. The financial condition of the nations right now is another element. The sins of a few have wreaked havoc with the lives of many, as greed and dishonesty have destroyed livelihoods, educational possibilities, care for the aged, and multiple forms of creativity – and that’s just the aftermath of Ponzi schemes for which a handful will go to jail. If we want to be faithful, we need to be continually rediscovering that my needs are not the only significant ones. Ubuntu implies that selfishness and self-centeredness cannot long survive. We are our siblings’ knowers and their keepers, and we cannot be known without them – we have no meaning, no true existence in isolation. We shall indeed die as we forget or ignore that reality.

Rev. Peg Chemberlin, Executive Director, Minnesota Council of Churches: Great Western heresy -- that any of us alone can be in right relationship with God?

Excerpt:

This week the Episcopal Church in America is having their national convention. The presiding bishop, Katharine Jefferts Schori opened with an address that is causing a great deal of conversation. She said, “the great Western heresy – is that we can be saved as individuals, that any of us alone can be in right relationship with God. It's caricatured in some quarters by insisting that salvation depends on reciting a specific verbal formula about Jesus. That individualist focus is a form of idolatry, for it puts me and my words in the place that only God can occupy, at the center of existence, as the ground of being. That heresy is one reason for the theme of this Convention.”

Now her statement is being interpreted by the backlash as if she were saying that we will be saved by the Church or by our social advocacy. I don’t see that there. I see her saying that God is in the center, that God is the deliverer of salvation (as well as reconciliation, redemption and re-creation) and that we cannot do anything except to choose, or not, to open our heart to God’s saving grace in our lives.

What the speech does is raise issue with some of the emphasis that we have seen in, what we have come to call, a more ‘evangelistic’ approach. So let us wade into the discussion and let’s start with the question so often asked by this personal approach. “Do you accept Jesus as your personal Lord and Savior?”

If this question intends to encourage folks to make a very personal, deeply centered decision to trust in the Love of God, then, this is a good question to be asked and answered. If this question means, that the relationship is a personal one only and has nothing to do with the world and society than I must agree with the presiding bishop it represents a heresy. For those of us who are Christians, we have too often been invited to stand at the foot of the cross to see how much Jesus loves us, but we are far too rarely asked to look around and see who else is standing there, realizing we are in this together. We have far too often been led to ignore the other crosses on the hill. If we ignore the crosses of the world we are ignoring the ones God loves. We are far too rarely asked to note the others who are choosing to embrace that God’s love is for everyone, even those who aren’t standing at the foot of the cross.

Comment: Consider the source! False prophets!