![\"Goya_Tribunal\"](\"https:\/\/theamericanjesus.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/Goya_Tribunal-1024x640.jpg\")
(H\/T Wikipedia<\/a>)<\/p>\nYou\u2019re a heretic.<\/em><\/p>\n I\u2019m a heretic.<\/em><\/p>\n She\u2019s a heretic.<\/em><\/p>\n He\u2019s a heretic.<\/em><\/p>\n Maybe it\u2019s just me, but it seems like you can\u2019t venture into the world of the Christian Internet without avoiding accusations of heresy being lobbed from one theological camp to another.<\/p>\n Branding folks like Brian McLaren or Rob Bell or Rachel Held Evans as heretics as become something of a sad recreational sport with entire websites and \u201cministries\u201d devoted to seeking out and \u201cexposing false teachers.\u201d<\/p>\n But what is heresy really?<\/p>\n I don\u2019t think most of us really know.<\/p>\n We have this vague notion of false teaching, but more often than not our version of false teaching seems to be little more than opinions that differ from our own. We may be convinced deep in our soul that what is being said is heresy, but the truth is most of us can\u2019t really explain why.<\/p>\n And, no, quoting a Bible verse does not prove someone is a heretic.<\/p>\n On the flip side of things, what about orthodoxy?<\/p>\n The internet is filled with self-appointed champions of orthodoxy and coalitions of the faithful who are convinced that their version of the Christian faith is the very definition of orthodoxy. And so they stand boldly on the front lines in the battle to preserve the true gospel.<\/p>\n Or at least so they claim.<\/p>\n Unless you\u2019re a super theology nerd it can all get pretty confusing and incredibly exhausting really quickly.<\/p>\n While I am one of those super theology nerds with an\u00a0academic background in both theology and the history of the church, I\u2019m not interested in becoming yet another self-appointed arbiter of the faith. But I thought perhaps I could lend my hand and\u00a0bring a bit of clarity to the heresy wars by trying to explain as simply as possible what orthodoxy and heresy really are with the naiv\u00e9 hope that maybe, just maybe it might help someone somewhere avoid being burned at the digital stake.<\/p>\n Now, I know the words \u201corthodoxy\u201d and \u201cheresy\u201d may sound technical and boring, but they\u2019re critically important concepts to all of us who call ourselves Christian, even if we pride ourselves on doctrinal ambivalence. Why? Because for the Church, orthodoxy and heresy aren\u2019t just about right and wrong ways of thinking.<\/p>\n In the Church, we believe that it is our beliefs that shape how we live. And all of us, no matter how theologically disinclined we might be, have deep convictions about how life is best lived.<\/p>\n Again, this post isn\u2019t about defining what those right or wrong ways of living are, but I do want to offer a basic resource for anyone who has found themselves lost in the middle of the heresy wars.<\/p>\n Because this is just a blog post, I will try to keep things as short as possible and, thus, I undoubtably be oversimplifying things that are far more complicated than I might make them sound.<\/p>\n I\u2019m also going to be taking a slightly different approach than what you might be accustomed to. Rather than talking about\u00a0\u201cwhat is within the bounds of orthodoxy,\u201d I think it is\u00a0more helpful to talk about orthodoxy and heresy as polar opposites with lots of space in-between.<\/p>\n Hopefully, that will make sense by the end of this post if it doesn\u2019t already.<\/p>\n But enough with the introduction.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s talk\u00a0about orthodoxy. Orthodoxy, as defined by Merriam-Webster, is \u201ca belief or a way of thinking that is accepted as true or correct.\u201d<\/p>\n While that might appear to be a pretty straight-forward definition, there\u2019s a lot<\/em><\/strong> going on with that word \u201caccepted.\u201d<\/p>\n Who decides what\u2019s accepted?<\/em><\/p>\n How did they decide?<\/em><\/p>\n When did they decide?<\/em><\/p>\n And who gave them that authority in the first place?<\/em><\/p>\n Welcome to the wonderful world of church history.<\/p>\n Ok, I know you probably don\u2019t find it as wonderful as I do, so I\u2019ll skip most of the details and just say this: you can\u2019t understand Christian orthodoxy without knowing something about the history of the Church<\/em>. The beliefs we\u2019ve come to call orthodoxy\u00a0didn\u2019t just fall from heaven one day. They developed over time and in particular circumstances that presented particular challenges the Church needed to meet.<\/p>\n Although the Bible was the jumping off point, it quickly became obvious\u00a0that clarification was needed on the most important issues of faith. So, the leaders of various churches in various areas of the world would, on occasion, come together to sort things out. Out of these meetings, called ecumenical councils, came things like the Nicene Creed and various other doctrinal pronouncements that defined Christian\u00a0orthodoxy.<\/p>\n But when it comes to that orthodoxy, there are at least 4 critical things to remember.<\/p>\n The most important thing to remember about orthodoxy is that it requires\u00a0unity, or at least some semblance of a unified group agreeing and\u00a0defining what their orthodox beliefs will be<\/strong>.<\/em> Which means if we\u2019re going to talk about universal (or at least near universal) Christian orthodoxy, we have to go back to some time\u00a0before\u00a0the year 1054, back before the messy divorce between Eastern and Western Christianity, back when Christianity was something resembling enough of a unified concept that\u00a0talking about Christian orthodoxy makes sense.<\/p>\n That\u2019s not to say that after the Great Schism of 1054 we all stopped agreeing on basic doctrines. We didn\u2019t. But\u00a0disunity throws a big wrench in the \u201caccepted\u201d part of orthodoxy. Which means if doctrines weren\u2019t established until say, the 16th or 19th century by a particular denomination or tradition, they are not orthodoxy for the entire Church.<\/p>\n The second important thing to remember is orthodoxy doesn\u2019t work on assumptions.<\/em> <\/strong><\/p>\n Rather than lines in the sand, I think it\u2019s best to think about orthodoxy as the foundation of the faith. Because it is the foundation for what we believe and therefore how we live, the church has always found it incredibly\u00a0important to establish that foundation by writing it down. Which is why creeds were formed and councils convened. They established what is or is not fundamental to the Christian faith. If it wasn\u2019t written down in a creed or conciliar confession, it wasn\u2019t considered a fundamental part of the faith.<\/p>\n But what about the Bible?<\/p>\n Well, that leads us to the third important important thing to remember when it comes to orthodoxy: the Bible alone does not define orthodoxy<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n I know that may sound strange and will no doubt enrage the fundamentalists among us, but it\u2019s true.<\/p>\n Now, the Bible is obviously and absolutely both critical and foundational for shaping the orthodoxy of the Church. However, the Bible says a lot things. Sometimes those things are really confusing and other times they sound pretty contradictory. Which is why the Bible requires interpretation.<\/p>\n As we all know all too well, one single verse can be interpreted in a myriad of ways. Some good, some not so much. It was in response to this sort of confusion and disagreement that the first creeds were formed and various Church councils called.<\/p>\n Creeds and councils came about to essentially define what the right interpretation of scripture (and the faith) is in a foundational way. By that I don\u2019t mean they met to decide what\u00a0each and every Bible verse should mean. Rather, they met to lay the foundation for how scripture in general should be read and, thus, the faith understood.<\/p>\n That foundation, which we call orthodoxy, is intended to properly guide how we read and understand the fundamental\u00a0message of the Bible. That is why\u00a0we can have so many competing views or interpretations of\u00a0foundational\u00a0issues like the atonement with\u00a0none or very few of them being actual heresy.<\/p>\n Now, in laying this foundation, it\u2019s also important to understand that those who formed our earliest creeds and convened at the ecumenical councils didn\u2019t believe that they were creating something new. Quite the opposite<\/em>. The early church fathers and mothers believed they were being led by the Spirit and guided by scripture to reveal the deepest truths of the faith.<\/p>\n In other words, they weren\u2019t inventing new doctrines (and, no, the Trinity was not invented at a church council), they were clarifying the fundamental testimony of scripture.<\/p>\n Finally, given our place in a 21st century Church filled with thousands of denominations and traditions, it\u2019s critically important to remember that there are actually 2 different types of orthodoxy<\/em><\/strong>.<\/p>\n The first type of orthodoxy is what I have been describing so far. It\u2019s the type of orthodoxy that was established before 1054 when the one holy Church was still literally one Church (more or less).<\/p>\n Of course, the Church split once again during the Protestant Reformation and\u00a0in the centuries since Luther, countless new denominations and traditions have formed, each with their own particular doctrines that makes them distinct from other Christian traditions.<\/p>\n In other words, they have their own orthodoxy<\/em>.<\/p>\n Many, many of the heresy battles we get into stem from this diversity of orthodoxy.<\/p>\n In our zeal to defend the faith, we denounce others as heretics without realizing that we\u2019re actually defending our version of the faith or our denomination\u2019s version of the faith, not the core orthodoxy laid down by the earliest creeds and councils of the Church universal. That doesn\u2019t make our particular theological traditions heresy, necessarily, but it does mean that what makes them distinctive from one another is, by definition, not orthodoxy.<\/p>\n Which also means\u00a0heresy is not quite as rampant in the Church as many of us have been led to believe.<\/p>\n In fact, it\u2019s actually pretty rare.<\/p>\n But what is heresy anyway?<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Simply defining\u00a0heresy as false teaching isn\u2019t very helpful.<\/p>\n For, if I were to say that the form of baptism doesn\u2019t matter, someone in a tradition that insists on full immersion might accuse me of false teaching. However, neither belief is\u00a0heresy\u2026.or orthodoxy.<\/p>\n Real\u00a0heresy is those beliefs that either reject or stand in explicit conflict with some component of the Church\u2019s (pre-1054) creeds or conciliar confession. Or you might say it\u2019s\u00a0those beliefs (such as Arianism) that have been explicitly denounced as anathema by an ecumenical council.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n If orthodoxy is about establishing the basic foundation for the faith, then heresy requires opposition to that foundation, not simply an interpretation of that foundation that we don\u2019t agree with.<\/p>\n That also means that just because someone interprets the Bible differently, that doesn\u2019t necessarily make them a heretic. We may pride ourselves on our ability to proof-text our enemies to death, but if we insist on branding them heretics, it\u2019s to the creeds and councils we must appeal, not the Bible alone.<\/p>\n Once again, when we do that, we discover that actual\u00a0heretics in the Church are few and far between. There are certainly some people who oppose parts of, say, the Apostles\u2019 Creed, but not many who do so and still claim to be Christian.<\/p>\n Nevertheless,\u00a0even if we suspect that someone is teaching or preaching heresy, credibility demands we do the hard work of carefully comparing what they\u2019re saying with the creeds and conciliar confessions of the Church universal before we try to burn them at the stake. Because it\u2019s very likely that what they\u2019re saying isn\u2019t in fact heresy at all. It\u2019s just something we don\u2019t want to agree with.<\/p>\n Which is why heresy is not quite the\u00a0trump card we want it to be.<\/p>\n And why we need to remember that there\u2019s a lot of room\u00a0for disagreement in the Christian faith before one ever approaches the threshold of authentic heresy.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Ok, so we\u2019ve talked about orthodoxy and we\u2019ve talked about heresy.<\/p>\n I want to finish up by talking about the space in-between because I think that\u2019s where many of our beliefs are actually found.<\/p>\n As I said at the beginning, I think it\u2019s helpful to think about orthodoxy and heresy as polar opposites. If we do think about things in that way, then we begin to discover that there is a whole lot of faith going on in the in-between, beliefs that doesn\u2019t rise to the standard of orthodoxy for the entire Church, but neither is it antithetical to the foundational confessions and creeds of the faith.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n Simply put,\u00a0many, many beliefs the are neither orthodoxy nor heresy. Even some of our most deeply held beliefs aren\u2019t actually orthodoxy. That is to say, though they may built upon a solid foundation and thus be orthodox in the sense that they don\u2019t contradict creed or confession, they themselves are not the foundation the Church has established as necessary to the faith.<\/p>\n They fall in the space in-between the foundation of orthodoxy and the limits of heresy.<\/p>\n And therein lies the spark that ignites so many battles in the Church.<\/p>\n Things\u00a0like creationism vs. evolution, inerrancy or errors, penal substitution or ransom theory, pacifism vs. just war, though foundational to those who adhere to them, they are actually just interpretations\u00a0of Christian orthodoxy. They are not themselves foundational tenets of the faith.<\/p>\n In other words, orthodoxy professes\u00a0that\u00a0God is the maker of heaven and earth and that Jesus died for our salvation, but it does not define how God created or how exactly atonement was made.<\/p>\n So you might say that orthodoxy tells us what Christians must believe, but not how we must believe it.<\/p>\n Unfortunately, as you know all too well, in real life it\u2019s not that easy.<\/p>\n There are a\u00a0seemingly infinite number of issues and disagreements about what we \u201cmust believe\u201d\u00a0that needlessly lead to accusations of heresy. Which is why if there is to be any hope of a cease-fire in the heresy wars, it won\u2019t come about until we learn to make space for that disagreement and stop trying to hold others to our own tradition\u2019s version of orthodoxy.<\/p>\n That is to say, peace won\u2019t come about\u00a0until we find the humility to admit that maybe, just maybe our beliefs are just that.<\/p>\n Our<\/em> beliefs.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" (H\/T Wikipedia) You\u2019re a heretic. I\u2019m a heretic. She\u2019s a heretic. He\u2019s a heretic. Maybe it\u2019s just me, but it seems like you can\u2019t venture into the world of the Christian Internet without avoiding accusations of heresy being lobbed from one theological camp to another. Branding folks like Brian McLaren or Rob Bell or Rachel […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3437,"featured_media":13127,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"\n
\n\u00a0<\/p>\nORTHODOXY<\/h3>\n
HERESY<\/h3>\n
THE SPACE IN-BETWEEN<\/h3>\n