PHILIP SCHAFF MAY 091994 LIBRARY
THE NEW MERCERSBURG REVIEW
Journal of the Mercersburg Society
Number 15 Spring 1994 'mE NEW MERCERSBURG REV I EW Journal of the Hercers~rg Society
R. Howard Paine, ECi tor
Officer s of t he Soci ety
President Horace 'f. Allen, Jr. vice Pr esident R. Howa rd Paine Secretary J ohn C. Miller Treasurer James H. Gold
Execut ive vice President Jeffr e y L. Roth
Executive O*",d ttee
Deborah R. ClatEi LS Linden J . De Aie Jo"m B. Payne Benjamin 'f . Gri ffin Harry G. Royer
Th!.~ Mercersburg R~ i ew is published semi - annually t Editorial Office The New Mercersb.lrg Review 762 TamaraCk 'frail Reading. Pennsylvania 19607 6JQ'III-0679 THE NE W MERCERSBURG REVIE \~ Number 15 Spring 1994 CONTENTS Editorial introduction 1 R. Howard Paine 3 Bucer and Nevin: A New Loo~ at the German Reforme0 Tradition Dehorah Ra~ Clemens 28 As Firm as As~es : A Sermon Deborah RaMo Clemens 31 John Williamson Nevin and American Na t ionali sm Richar d E. Wentz 43 No t es on Nevin ' s Family II Jo!m R. Weiler 50 An Unexpected Find John R. Weiler 5J Address Delivered at the Memorial Service for Dr . John N. Nevin Emanuel V. Ge rhart 55 '!'he Mercersburg Lit urgical Controversy: A Call f or Objective Worship 'I'horras G . Wsh 62 The Churc'1 of "The Most beautiful and Peorfect Liturgical Service: " A Review Article Ben j amin GRiffin , EDITORIAL INl'RCOJcrICN Thumbing through previous issues of becorres aware of the focus whi ch defines the importance It serves as an organ for gathering and disseminating writings from a variety of scholar s. Also i t prcmotes study by inviting others to pursue new avenues of thought whi ch are opened up by SOI'I\E! of the writers. It certainly offers convincing evidence that our relatively small membership in the Society is a very productive group, for mst of the articles which are published in the Spring issues are the work of those who are affiliated wi th us closely. 'Ihis issue offers two writings by Del:orah Rahn Clerrens whose graduate study has been centered on Mercersburg concerns. The article on Bucer and. Nevin, written as a Festschrift for Dr. Howard Hageman, late president of the Society, p.rrsues SatE' new inSights into the influence of the strassburg reformer among our spiritual forebears. The parallels drawn with Mercersburg evoke further study along these lines. The sermon was delivered at the Ash Wednesday service at Lancaster Seminary at which our Society was invited to provide leadership last y~. We are grateful for permission to reprint the article by Richard Wentz in which he explores a p:>litical side of Nevin which has often been overlooked. ,John weiler continues his research into the descendants of John Nevin, many of whan were quite distinguished in their o..n right. '!his ti.Jre he turns his attention to son Robert Nevin who has a most interesting history. In the course of \'Ieiler' s search for material he has made the acquaintance of Nevin ' s great granddaughter wOCI has given him a collection of letters and ackl.resses which will be placed in the archives in the SChaff Library at Lancaster SEminary. '!he Gerhart eulogy which we have transcribed was taken froo the original in Gerhart ' s o..n handwriting and, as far as we Jmot...o, has never been printed before. The article by TIlom3.s Lush was presented at a theolcqical roundtable of the Mercersburg Asscx:iaticrl of the United OIurch of Christ and represents again the kind of interest that is still being fostered among parish ministers as well as more academic scholars. In a book review Ben Griffin brings to our attention a work of prohibitive oost which we may want to search for in a library. It deals with the Catholic A{:ostolic Olurch wOCIse liturgy had such a profound effect upon Philip Schaff during the ti.Jre that he and Nevin were engaged in the preparation of the Order of Worship of the Gennan RefoIneU Olurch, the work which caused so much of the controversy about which Lush has written. Q1e year henoe we shall be looking for material to be included in another Spring issue of '!he Review. We earnestly invite any aroong you wOCI read these words to submit material for consideration. R. Howard Paine, Editor I 8UCER AND NE.VIN A NEloi UXI( AT nIE GERMAN REFCRMJ:D 'mADITIOO DiliJrah RaM Clerens Ph.D. Candidate in Liturgics Drew University, 11adison, New Jersey ~1artin Bucer and John Nevin were not only separated by the massive Atlantic rut were kept apart by nearly three centuries of The former lived while Erasmus penned In Praise of Folly, while sculpted the Pieta, and while the Mona Lisa was imrortalized by DaVinci. '!he latter experienced the world of Harriet Beecher Stowe's ReIuir , /obnet, and Tchaikovsky. Sucer's world carre to went into the business of printing. It was torn by holy wars, reasant and shameful executions for heresies. Nevin's world was stnlggUng to adjust to the revelation in Darwin I s Origin of the Species and to the introduction of scientific theory. It was shattered by the Civil War and the shame of slavery. The O'lUrch of sixteenth century furore was embroiled in the terrors and the thrills of reforming. 'I1le Olurch of nineteenth century America toyed wi th the techniques of the Great Awakenings. Bucer and Nevin shared very little in ccmron except for strikingly similar theolOCJies . My objective is to ccmpare and oontrast the central doctrines of these two great divines; to look t:eyond the scx:io-cultural peculiarities of the times; an::l then to dare to suggest that the similarities t:etween these men indeed are not (X)incidental but are in fact traceable through a definite liturgical and catechetical line. BUCER'S LIFE Martin Bucer was oorn in Schlettstadt Germany in 1491. Educated as a D:::minican, he became familiar with the thought of Erasmus and Humanism. In 1518 exposure to the great Hartin Luther set his head spinning. Young Bucer was enthralled with the forthright solid Biblical teachings of the man fran Wittenberg. Luther articulated everything Bucer had secretly been thinking. After being privileged to meet with Luther in a private audience Bucer was on a course of no return. Fran this day on he was a fellow pioneer on the trail to Reform. He managed to get himself dismissed fran the D:minicans and then expelled fran his Wissemb:::lurg parish for radical preaching. It was here IOClSt likely that Buoer rehearsed and polished his radicalism. In the free city of Strassburg, thanks to the Reforned Matthew Ze11 ' s invitation, Bucer found asylum. strassb.rrg, a city in the German (!'lOW French) Alsace and Lorraine region, was a strategic location during this perioo of the Reformation . It was at a crossroad of political, econanic, and religious activities for roost of all European nations . As one of the largest cities in the Holy Ratlan ~ire , Strassburg was a natural incubator for new thought and an ideal place for experimentatioo. With its nearly independent polity the local magistrates and the people exercised discipline. Because of its liberal abrosphere farrous dissidents such as Ziegler, Carlstadt, Denck, Sattler, Marpeck, SC~wenkfeld, HofflMll, Frank, and Servetus all at one time or another checked in. The municipal tolerance was in no way as accannodating as is known to the rrodern AlTerican, rut strassburg was gracious enough to prefer exiling rabble rousers to beheading, hanging, or torching them. In this electric environrrent Bucer quickly rose to be the undisputed leader of the l ocal Reformation. He gained general respect through his ample teaching, 3 chi basic conciliatory nature and. prolific writing. Ie organized public ~~ls:developed gpvernmental poliCY, and unified the people by Producing an evangelical liturgy. 'lbroughout his dynami~career Bucer managed to exert, direct i nfluence on Farel, calvin, and Poullain. Farel was exposed to Bucer s tal ents early on having served in s trassburg in 1525 . In 1530 he p.rrposefully returned t o this city in order to study f onus of worship. He adap~ Buc~r 's f~nns for the ~crarrent of Baptism and the service for Olristian marnage. Calv~n and Paulla1n l::orrOlred rrajor liturgical passages frem Bucer's 1539 Strassburg f orm for Holy G:mnunion. Most OCI~le of these are the fucharistic pr~yer and the order for confession of sins. 'Ihroogh calvin and Farel the ent1re Huguenot church bore Bucer ' s illlprint. Via Galvin and Paullain, Bucer left his mark en all Fhglish, Scottish, and Dutch Presbyterianism. '!he m::rnentum kept ooilding. Ignited with a zeal for Protestant union, &.leer became a central figure in a lmost all theological colloquies l:etween the great giants of the Reformation comnunions. Under the Landgrave of Hesse ' s direction he organized and mediated in the farrous t-mburg Collcquy of 1529 between the 6 Lutherans and the Zwinglians. Nor" he finnly believed that wther and Zwingli themselves would eventually care to accord Ellcharistically. For the next two de::ades Bncer s lavishly worked to interpret the words of these giants so that opposing camps could care to r ecognize a bit of the truth in theJll . Both would agree , he hoped, in the concept of Olrist being really present in the SUpPer: Spiritually. i\long with capito he penned the COnfessio Tetrapolitana which set forth a Eucharistic dcx:;trine ascribed by four surrounding German cities. At the Wi7"tenberg Concord of 1536 he carre incredibly close to acccmplishing such unity. Bucer did OCIt limit his ecurrenical passion to only the Orthodox Protestants . He ~ged . to co:uc mass numbers of Anahapti::g:s not to sever frem the Reformed CUlltllU1lon 1n a nuraculous campaign in Hesse. In addition to the o ften suspect Anaba.p~sts, Bucer extended the right hand of fellowship to even the Reman cathohcs. At the Regensburg conference of 1541 this disillusioned caninican was willing to propose that Protestants accept the primacy of the see of Rare so. long as the Pope's authority be held in check. Sane historians consider this conference (unt¥ Vatican II) the ''high water mark" in Rar.an catholic, Protestant relations. Bucer has suffered enormous criticism for his passion for ectmenical uroerstanding. He is accused. of canpranising theological integrity in his ~ch to please even the rrost stubOOrn. He is judged as a failure because a um.ted ch.urch has ?ever CortE to f r.p&tioo. His influence up:n the actors involved 1S often nunimally credited. I suggest that these critiques have been for the rrost part unduly given. Hartin Bucer was secure enough as a : to allow himself to be open and to be influenced by other theologians. Rar.ans is11 00ha doubt that Luther, carlstadt, Zwingli , the Anateptists and the lti fa d a ~ in his deve lopnent. Bucer's willing exposure to the ~ aceted n;fonnation diSCUSsion worked to strengthen, not weaken his CINn I hi.msel~ position. Am, despite the accusations, Buce.r did not prostitute to Sign the°r.the ....~ of ~us. 'lhis is undeniably clear i n Bucer ' S refusal ugs...... g Interim. ~~c;nw: h: question that Martin Bu:.::er was highl y res[O:cted in his day . anta!}:)nists and ~~ by the Landgrave Philip o f Hesse to dialogue with ~ with the Anabaptists, Bucer was also asked to orgaruze 4 • his church and to write a liturgy for the region. Here Bucer ' s substantial con~~butions includ~ . the strengthening of the role of elder,.:z; a lay-ordained POSltion, and a dehmte form for the rite of confinnation. In 1543 he was solicited by yet another worldly prince, the Archbishop Hermann Von l'lied, to help design that 10::::a1 refonnation. A.lthough the overall task was tackled by a joint effort of men including lleaio, Pistorius, and ~lelancththooi Bucer was the primary architect of the lWgy in its final form and the sole author of the sections on the sacrarrents. By this tirre in his career Bucer was pleased to incorporate portions of the Lutheran Brandenberg-Nurnberg service into a structure which he made noticeably rrore catholic. Thus, through the liturgies of Hesse and Upon his death, King Edward of England grieved. His ~ remained so strong that the Reman catholic Q.J,een Mary found it necessary to exhume his bones and bum them p..Iblic1y. Years later Elizabeth I still resi?lfted him enough to order his ashes to be scooped up and reinterred honorably. BUCER ' S I.FGA.CY What went wrong? What was missing? l'ihy has Martin Bucer been virtually forgotten? l'ihy is his name not rrentioned along with the "greats" like Luther and and and Calvin? Poole's iooex of nineteenth century so much as list one reference to him. Roland canpletely ignores him. Although reo:.gnized in survey of the Reforlled liturgical traditioo) Bucer in a back rCM seat. Even Bucer ' s biographers have mixed opinions . ottO'l'lar Frederick Cypris writes: "It was the tragedy of Bucer ' s life that in all those concerns which1"'fre of vital i.rrp:lrtance to him he was either a couplete or qualified failure. " He was a failure if we are to judge him by the fact that to date there is yet no church union. The RefoLiled churches are still no closer to o:::nsolidating with the Lutherans . '!he Anabaptists' separatist trend am l~ theology of baptism and ccmnunion has affected even the rrost orthodox of Protestantism. Ani, although we no longer engage in wars, neither do we have any realistic hope of r econciling with the Ranans. But, could it be that Bucer was the 5 f the rrodern ecu:renical !lOVement? (buld it be that he, unlike \:he ~ypa~l °actor in the Reformation period, ~d ~fbef yond ~e struggles of his . ,_ "~en the church would heal l.ts di erences. c:wn day to a ,... I.m"" WI' " true that BJcer'S Euchari stic theology ~s never offiCially aOOpted at It 1.5 Luthe went so far as _" 1" tha the c1 assic Reformatioo conferrrs .. :r: . . . Ylll9 t BaJCer no less than treasonous . He was Vl.ewed w1th Suspl.Cl.on t7t the Mss ~ , uccessors Zanchi and Stunn misrepresented him as a sacrarrentarian. T9 Even s~:SsbJrg itself re~diated the Q:nfessio Tetra-politana as early as 1598 claiming ~t in 1531 &.leer ackr¥:lwledged the superi ori.ty o f the theology of the Lutherans. Bucer could not win ov~ the st ubbor n glants .. Bu~ this is not to say that he did not have substantial wfluence in the E)Jchanstl.c uMerstanding of countless Protestants .. It may be very likely that Bucer was the nan wIxl rrolded the Eucharistic thought of John calvin, Philip Me lanchthcn, 'nlaras Cramer am the English .. Wilhelm Pauck discussing 8IJcer ' s writings says: It is unk:n::1.m I"lc:M widely these books were distributed and what impact they exercised. Today, ~Y are to be f ound only in the rare-txxlk. ICXJilts of a few l ibraries .. And again: In view of the close affinity and resemblance of his i deas to those of Calvin, one might assume that the Puritans ~uld have teen drawn to him, particulady be: ause of his prop::l6als in But this is not the case and, inded , there is to shc:J,.i that Blrer ' s total program made a deep ~ion up:x1 any churchmen in either the Anglican or the Puritan party. Likewise there is little evidence to show that Bucer made a lasting impressicn 00 the French, the DJtch, the Swiss, the Germans! There are no Bllcprian churches as there are wtherans. People do not claim to be Buceri ans as so mmy claim to be Zwinglians or calvinists . Is the renaissance of the study of this man purely for the arrrusement of the historians who get high inhaling the stench ~ dusty attics? I think not! Instead, I propose that -aucer ' s spirit is to this very day vitally important and active. Bucer has much to say that can be dire::tly applied to the church's current situation. Nevertheless it is appropriate that the name of Martin Bucer is not attached to any ooe denaninatioo or se:L. 8ucer was not interested in establishing a cult to venerate him. Bl lCer ' S cnt3' goal was to bJild up the body of O1rist and the fell£M;hip of Olristians. What went wrong? Perhaps nothing. JOON WII.I.IAMSl:l'oI NEVIN In central Pennsylvania in the middle o f the 19th century lived a rrost unusual man. Born of Scottish ancestry, he was raised a Presbyterian. In his youth John Williamsoo Nevi n was nurtured in the faith on the Westminster catechism in g:is~l of Reforrrer John Calvin and believed himse lf to be a faith~~ I an. DJring his adolescence he experienced an emotional conversion whi ~~ /Web in 19th century American fashion. 'nle young man foond this had always ~;tUyn =ing. W~ he perilously mistaken in his belief that: subjective Skil1: of ~Christi~? was all legitimate faith ~vin's sacramantal theology 1th in:li.Vl.dual persm? Cl:Juld he at"" W his cb::::trine of soon 6 Partially recovered, ~ ente red Princeton ?leological seminary where he excelled in Biblical studie s and i n Hebrew. He proved h i mself to be a stOOent of the highBst repute. Yet, he could find no direction in which he believed his skills could best be used. \'ihen Pro fessor Q\arlas ,lodge took a sabbatical leave Nevin was employed as his s ubstitute. After t hi:o; tiJre he was enployed as Professor of Biblical Lite rature at the tlestern 'Iheological seminary in Pittsburgh. He served in this ~ition for ten years (1830-1840) . Most likel y it was here that Nevin ' s ~~blical skills were fine tuned . Still, the theol ogical dilenma continued. In 1840 Nevin was drafted to cone to ~lercersburg, Pennsylvania, to serve as Professor of '!heology for the Q:lrman Refonned Q\urch. "No2F~nent was ever more J?rovidential account for my life ••• " Nevin notes . In ~rcersburg Nevin's mind was t r ansported to Gennany . Urrler Dr. Frederich Augustus Rauch ; tutelage , .John Nevin became acquainted with German thought am philosophy. 2 As an adopted rrerrber of the Ger.nan Refonned family, Nevin took his teaching responsibilit.ies in the theological seminary seriously. '!hanks to his new intellectual approach, Nevin discovered the rich treasures of history. 'Ihus, this brilliant scholar began to read, to research, to rediSC0\7er the German Refotlled heritage. In his search he discovered the revelatory p::Mer of the Ap:>stle ' s Creed (which Nevin was unaccust aued to using in his Presbyterian background, minis try, or tClachi ng) , '!he He idelberg catechism (the doctrinal standard since 1563) , and the Palatinate Liturgy (which by this time i n America was virtually e xti nct) . Juxtap:!sed with his study was t.~e ever blaring picture of the current Asrerican religiOUS scene. '!he Puritan attitudes about the church, the sacraJnents, and I«)rship had so overshado.red American life that even the rrnst orthodox of denaninations, (such as i\oglican, Lutheran, and those in the RefoIliel family) had prostituted their ide..'ltities. The Faith fought for and died for by the Reformers ....' dS so contorted by rrodern rationalistic and pietistic terdencies that the grotesque fonn resulting would have been unrecognizable by those very Hen in the sixteenth century. It was the same Faith, Nevin asserted, exp:>unded by the early church fatJ,ers, yet the sectarian mind had forgotten the legacy. It was the sa.'1e Fai th which had cootinued as a thread of truth throughout the church catholic, yet the affiliation was flatly denied due to prej udicial thinking. It was the same Fai th preserved in the scr ipture and hel d by the Apostolic coiliiLll'lity . I t \-.'as tJle Faith of the creed. Joim ~Iilliamson Nevin devoted his life to r eclaiming and reinterpreting that Faith for tha spir itual descendants of Reforned Germany . In his endeavors he challenged the entire lIn"erican Protestant world to do the same. Along with Philip SChaff, his newly found colleague who arrived fresh 00 AUlerican soil ftan no other place but Germany , he called forth yet another reformation in the church ' s history. I t was not to t.~e subjective erroUonalism of the Great A~lakening . "Rather, i t focused p.rrely on the objective gift of Grace i.mpJted into the I«)r ld in the Incarnation of the ruity . It centered not so much on the I«)r ks o f Jesus and of his t eaching, but on every fact of Otrist ' s being i His CO"lIing , His dyi ng, His resurrection, and His ascending . Salvation is dependent not so much on the tenuous moralisms of i ndivi dual persons, nor on sane a t titude o f the luck of the draw predestinat ion, but 00 the prcx::es s of sanctifi cation whereby we are drawn int o Otrist via a rfro{stical lD"lion . 'Ihe Olurch i s not j ust a vol untary organization, but is the 00dy of OIrist am therefore the channel of Divine Grace am mediation. 7 n At 11erCersburq, thanks t o the German ,~tion , ::i f ound answers to his haunting spiritual questions . He ta,,;," sacr aue ks ' ecclesiastical, theology with a passion. His major war '-'v criticizes the emotional manip.1lation of •• (1846) which teaches Ref oilied theol0gy (1848 condemning the theology of the sects, and (1866) wh ich r eunited mrl and Evangelical context. 'l\'e German Refarrred church o..res John Williamson Nevin an irmeasurable debt. He recaptured for tian their rrost unique ~ritage jus,t as it ~ in danger of being lost forever in the wave of Ame.ncan sectananism. He recalled its sacramental theology fran a misconstrued zwinglianism. He steered it in a course f.f1r ecume.ni.sm \oIhich is no doubt res!X>l"lsible for i ts two successive unions. Nevin and Schaff's liturgical inrovations set the German Ref Wiled church decades ahead of most other denominations. And , he is directly respcnsible for its loog starding, but not static, highly respectable worship traditioo. Still, Nevin and the J1ercersburg movement are not ccmoonly lm::t.Jn to rrost lIo1em clergy and a:ngregatia'lS ,.,.he l:enefit fran the heritage. 11any who value the sacramental theology and worship custcms have li ttle idea of their unique quality or origins. SCtre think o f Hercersburg as stuffed shirt formalism. sane. surmise that Nevin inflicted his church with an alien Ronanien. Still others believe that worship and sacrarrental life in the current denani.naUoo was always in line with the congregatiooal traditicn. It is very difficult to assess Nevin' 5 influence on Arrerican Protestantism in general. As with ~lartin Bua>r there has been precious little research 00ne en the subject. During his life , Nevin was respected as an outs"''' theologian by the academic ccmm.mity. But he was rarely l oved. his classic, was often given inadequate attention religious I suggest tha~ Nevi~ has been denied his r ightful place in the annals of ~ican religl.ous hl.story f or the follCJ,o,!ing r easons. First, his writing style was vertx;me and so advanced that he is often difficult to read. secondly, just as Nevin s works were ccrn.ing to the for efront the United states became engaged in, the i1DSt brutal war of its hiStory. '!he Civil l'lar threatened the very eXl.steoce ,of the natim, its purpose and its integrity. Survival, ~ ecclesiastl.ca! debate daninated the lVre.rican psyche. 'the Crofederate 1 5 ~of ~sburg in 1863 iT\arked the end of the l,1e,rcersburg seminary· s re, Nevin is a victim of his ~ personality. Perhaps the !lOSt wi~ling ~ast betlrleen John Nevin and Martin Bucer is the lrIay they dealt u.... __:on y. Both man were devoted to the cause o f church uni~y· .-....n;::v=, Barer was kncr.m to bend ' ti'oo while Nevin blasted over backwards to aPfE'ase the oppos~ and frien:Uy perhathem unrrercifully. Had he made an e ffort to be oore patien:,."" Finall ' I ,PS nnre would have been willi ng to listen to hiro S7"" Nevin,y, think the very denominatim that i s resp::nsible f or speathea log di~i:;og;:s ~logicallY is also r esp:KlSible for srrothering :: • c acter of the German Reformed church in America be<: 8 downrig~t nas~Y as it ,f~ht its o.m civil ...ar over the question o f liturgy. What nel'J~l.ng ~natlon ~ld revere it as a b..ilwark of Olristian unity? As an irorllcal tWl.st, due to lts ecumenical coulIlitment, the German Ref onred church today has nearly l ost i ts identity through organic union with other denominations. 'Ihis nakes i t all the nnre difficult for otiler Olristian CXJIIIIlllJlions to appreciate the legacy , Arrerica tcday is literally overrun with independent congregations responsibl e to no authority but their own transient \>lhirns . The anxious bench has upjated according to the technolQ9Y of television evangelism. Liturgical literacy is at an all tiille law arronq clergy in even the German Refotued tradition. And, there are a few pastors in the un! ted Olurch of Olrist who refuse to acknowledge infant baptism. Was John Williamson Nevin nothing but a failure in his writing , teaching, and preaching? Let us not judge so quickly. Can we beqin to imagine the trerrerrlous impact l1ercersburg theology had on all of lrodern church history via Nevin ' s partner Philip SChaff? \'lhat might account for the so called "High church" rrovements which carre alive in America in the early twentieth century? Let us consider the ecuoonical lOCIVenE!nt which is alive and active tcday. Let us consider the liturgical renewal which has swept through rrost of the lrain line denominations in the past two decades. Let us recall the Protestant trend toward ccmnuning 1TOre f requently. If John Nevin can not be linked to these refonns physically, his spirit can be ind--d! BUCER' S INFWENCE 00 NEVIN The question for our consideration is whether there is any s ubstantial OXlJlE!Ction between i1artin Bu:er and John Nevin . I)::) the two have any nore i n CCIIITO'l besides the fact that both have been sa!1eWhat for<;ptten? Are the theological similarities really that astounding? Is the bond any closer than with any other churchly persons? Is this providence or coincidence? Nevin would be the first to insist that his theological orientation was not his own creation. His deliberate view of the Olurch would have precluded such a renegade way of thinking. Nevin believed that all Revelation could be traced like a thread throughout the historical church fran the tine of the Incarnation. 'Ihis is why history was so vitally important to him. I think. it an indisputable fact that Nevin was first inspired by the theological genius of the Germans . scx:.n he realized that this genius i s the sane as that preserved i n the He i delberg catechism, Tracing backwards he again found these truths in the Great Fathers of Olristendan. (D?monstrating heN the ~orllers drew fran the Olurch Fathers was me of Nevin ' s contrib..itions. ) As with all gcxxl Protestants, he judged his views in light of the scriptures and fClUl'd them to I:e consistent. Finally he also fOlllld. the sane seed in the ancient Apostles ' Creed which he believed to be the result o f direct Revelation. 'lbere was mly ttIe problem. What RefOI!leL" .....as respcnsible for the German Refotmed position? Surely Ursinus and Olevianus did not ccnjure up the Catechism 00 their own. ~ prevalent attitude i n the denatdnation in Nevin ' s time was that the theology was Zwinglian. Nevin knew that that was WI'al9. 'Mlerefore, he ini)~ally concluded that their Reformation mentor was none other than John Calvin. Yet, as the years went by he seems less and l ess c 9 ...... d do::trine solely to wtheran />Ielanchthon . Clearly there ar ~fo", d Perhaps the prevalent opinion tcrlay is that the German Re fo,""",~ differences. 1 . 1 of Z' l ' ,_. "'~ . . the result of a the<> o:)1ca consensus 101109 1 <1"", Calvin and ~~~~~ If this is so, who shall take credit f or blending the traditions? I st that Martin Bucer is that Reformation link that historians lflay have . s~ I ptwose that the theological similarities bet.... 'een Bucer and Nevin in lUl.~tials stict, as sacrarrental doctrine, ecclesiology, ecurre."lism, liturgical ~terest, understanding of hanan nat~e , and authori.ty can not be waved away as coincidence. I subnit that the Heldelberg C3techlsm. lI'1ay very well be lOOre Bucerian than zwinglian, calvinistic, or r'le lancthomaIlj and that there is stroog evidence to slv.l Bucer ' S prints en the liturgy of the Palatinate. Let I us give these pLoposals our attention. 'IHEOLCXiICAL SIMILARITIES 'IRE E1XlfARISI': Both nen, arer and Nevin, S{:eIlt the bulk of their careers wri ting (II the subject of Eucharistic Presence. Bucer, it seems, initially began in an effort to recmcile Zwingli and Luther. Nevin ' s objective was to call the church back. to the historic theology of its heritage. Q1e must be careful when considering Bucer ' s Eucharistic theology and retmber the oontext of the sixteenth century discussion. Failure to do this can lead ooe to regretfully misunderstand the man. (Ard, there has already been aq:lle misW'rlerstanding aOOut him.) In his early period 8ucer was misW'JderstC'J'Xi to be a Lutheran. Before the collcquy at Marburg IAlther misunderstood him to te a 5acr&rentarian. 'n1e was criticized. for being va9Uj4 ambiguous , and conflicting interpretations. Neverlli:lless Btx:er managed to bring coocord to two maj or factions in the sacramental debate at Wilj~q in 1536. At COlogne, he was praised fo~ his orthodoxy by Melanchthon. And, he was sought out for his sacramental Wlsd:m by 'Ihanas Cranner wten the 1549 Book of Q.:mocII1 Prayer was coosidered for revision. How dces ooe account for the vast variety of opinion? Clearly much can be credite:I to the developnent of 8ucer's thought and the originality of his cmclusl.oos. O:nstantin lIelpf says that Buoer neither changed fran a Zwinglian to a Lutheran as if he cnce was in favor of the one and then the other, but by conceiving the rights and I wrongs ~~ each of the bKl, he imbibed ideas of the two which appealed to him. ~thcugh Hopf can see why sare might judge Bucer as a Lutheran, and otherS as a winglian'3fe concll)'Ps that his Eucharistic theology is much closer to the ~l1=i G. J . Van Da Poll Jincls Bucer closer than any other refonreI' to cxnf i ogy of John Galvin. And , James Kittelson suggests that the ~oo exists because 8noer was personally never that concerned abOUt ~ ao::. ~ natur~ of ~ Presence in the elerrents. Instead of WOrryin9' so est novun tes mearu.ng of 00c est coLp.lS lIlewn 11 Bucer thought, "hOC p:x::ul~ verses 8 ,tamentun" and "Clines surrus unus ~s" were the roost critica attelliPl ~ s ,,~scu.sSion of the elem;mts, Kittelson declares, was out of ~ Buoer kne... ~be e~ warring factions so that the end result could .be !; true sacramental PJrpOSe; ccmm.mion or fellowshiP iIlP 10 \ 39 Qrristians . Ducer claimed that three things ....'ere given in the sacram::>nt. First, one receives bread and Wl ne . At the saUle tillY:', however , 'de also recelve the body and blood of Qrrist. ~ a result of this. we are also blesse,fu as recipients of a new covenant, forglveness, and ultlToately , new life. Christ is not received in the actual elements but through a sacram:mtal relationship with the bread and wine which is effected by the Holy Spirit. There is never any doubt that Christ is actually and uniquely present. lic:rwever, Bucer speaks of a spiritual, not physical canmunication. He said: I the body and blood of O1rist himself are truly present, not j ust effective, powerfully, effectively, spiritually, but vere, substantialiter, ess€'ntialiter, e~fentially, and truly, and are given and received wi th bread and wine . Of what nature of Olrist are we speaking? surely the divine nature of C1rist is ever present to those who are relieving . Is there anything unusual in the sacramental transaction? {No, the Swiss would say, except that through the ritual act our meliDry of O1rist's sacrifice and thus our ccmnit.rr€nt to Him is strengthened. ) But Bucer would insist that in the sacrament of the Eurnarist the human nature of Olrist is imparted. Here we are fed with the human Orrist which has ascended. At this \Xlint it would seem that Bucer is in concurrence witJ! the Lutherans. Not so. Luther claimed that O1rist's human bcdy was ubiquitous. This rreaning that sorrehow all r ighteous everywhere receive the actual material substance. Bucer disagreed . He said: Olrist is in heaven. His human nature is not diffused. I t is not to be restored to Earth until the Last ray. He is always with us in his Divine nature and His \Xlwei:' and Spirit; but we clearly receive his b:xly and blood by f aith, not as any process 0b this world, for our faith strives after Olrist as ~lan and t·iediator. . 43 We are united to the human Olrist via a mysterious , not carnal unlon. Faith is the condition. Faith is by no rreans the cause of the Grace which is given. Faith To those who receive worthily, change is demanded. It is through the Eucharist that the OIurch is creat ed . It is because of this Grace that we who are justified live ITOre and ITOre righteous lives. How dare we use this sacred meal to divide? we l::ecome one bread, one ~ 1I 5 one loving cOllluunity through participation in the body and blood of O1rlSt. NEVIN 00' THE E1JQlARIST : While defending himself against his opponents Nevin s\Jlllllarized his {:OSition: Any theory of the Eucharist will be found to accord closely wi th the view that is taken , at the same tirre of the nature of the \Dlion genera lly between Olrist and his people. Whatever the life of the believer may be as a whole in thi s relation, it must det ermine the II ' """"""union with the Saviour in the sacrarrent of the f onn 0 f h1S ...... " f ' . "f' d supper, as the central representationthe0 lt5, S ~ gnt. .l tcance ~-' ~ . Ref 'lllus I the sacrarrental dcx;trine of . pnnu 1. ~ 0 r: ' ~ '-',~ch stands inseparably connected with ~ l.d~ of an mwar? hVlng UIll.on between believer s and Orrist, 1.0 vntue o f whlch they are incorporated into his vefK nature, and made to s ubsist with him by the po¥,?r of CQl1TO'l Ufe. Nevin took great pains to denoostrate the fact ~t his theol~ of the mystical presence was no rrodern heresy wt was conslstent at all pomts with the teaching of the early church Fathers and with the Gennan Refomed heritage . He hoped that his study wou ld serve as a corrective to the prevalent Puritan thoory. With this in ruoo Nevin em!Xlasized that; the Presence is specific and unique; that the sacramental po..rer is a mystery (beyond hurnan knowled~ ) ; that the force is objective and therefore not dependent CI'l what we do or thlnki that all" union with Olrist is ac tual (versus simply rroral or ~ative)i that ~ ccmnunicate with Olrist' s humanity as well as his divinity. Nevin explicitly taught that Christ is not present in the bread or in the wine but is present i n the action o f ccmnuni.ng. His discussioo atout the elE!llel'lts , tv;,...oever , should in no way suggest a l ON or sacramentarian theology . Neither should it suggest that the union with Christ is any less binding than intllied in the highest 'ihcmastic philosophy. en the contrary, Nevin insisted.: "'Ihe participation is not simply in his Spirit, but in his flesh a l so and bl~e It is not figurative merely and moral , but real, substantial, and essential." The sacrament of the Euchari st is unique because here and here alone we are actually drawn into our Lord's humanity . "The COllnun!on is truly ~ fully with the Man Olrist Jesus , not simply with Jesus as the son of Cod." Why is this so important, so ....ondrously freeing? Because through the poo"..... r of the Holy Spirit we are assured that Christ has never teen cut o ff frem the life of the church. The crucifixioo did not sever the sacred Head fran his tx:rly like a French guillotine. Rather, in the Eucharist, "he is brought near er to it, aM made ale with it lIpre intimately, beyond measure in this way , than if he were still out~ly in the midst of it as in his days of flesh ." lIere see totality of the Savwur and the totality of the believer is fused perf ectly. ~ in keeping with Reformed doctrine Nevin agreed that Otri st's (Ylysical nature l.S at the right hand of the Father but is carrnunicated to us by the Spirit mystically. Therefore Grace is o:xweyed. Faith, however, is required if we are to benefit fran the gift Cod is offering. 'lhe.manducation of it is not oral but only by faith, It is present in fnu.~oo according to believe rs only in the exercise of faith; the L~~t and unbelieving receive only naked syml::ols , bread aM Wl.ne, Wl.thout any spiritual advantage to their souls. The fai~ul , hcr..oever, are rais ed by union with O"lrist to a new and higher form ~ life • . It can not .be reduced to morality alone or to a system of rules or . to Y particular practl.ce. &It, the Olristian enjoys a state of li'Stng by which e very Virtue, every action is informed by the Grace of the Gospel. 12 • I3A?I'ISN , ax:er's theol ogy of baptism follows a definite progression of thought which is not evidenced in Nevin. 01e must be diligent to get the whole picture before making any assessments. Here, as in no other place, Bucer shows Anabaptist influence. Scmetimes we do not see other r;eople's faults before ~ actually live with them. It appears that after "living" with the Anabaptists for a period of time, Bucer was able to better clarify his position. Perhaps it was when ~ witnessed his as~iate Capito's seemingly total o::lIlversion, that the red flags started waving. By the end of his life Bucer was securely reunited with the or thod:>x teaching. Let us briefly review the three stages mentioned. Stage one: the early (:Eriod, Bucer and the Anab.)ptists are co..lrting. Bucer can see no reason to legislate infant baptism as an lU1caupranising doctrine . Baptism is not a unique means of Grace, he begins. It does not guarantee regeneration. Bucer certainly provides for the baptizing of infants and children but will not conde!m those who opt to wait for the age of discretion or conversion. '!his is bEcause Bucer seems to make an artificial distinction between baptism with water and baptism of the Holy Spirit. '!hey do not necessarily coincide in timing. They are rot necessarily connected. Baptism is not so much a divine act, but a sign of the church's belief in a pranise that the ~dren of believers will at sane !=Oint or other be spiritually regenerated. Is there any danger in baptizing those who might never be reqenerated? ax:er believes there isn ' t. He says: 11hat is there in so much water? If we are to pray to God for all men , should we not wish also to comnit to GcXl. our children, to whan Qrrist acted with such kindness? Even if we baptize a few goats, whOll Qrrist ekes not baptize with his Spirit, it is ooly a fla tter of so much water and prayer. Lik~se the ap:lStles did not always succeed in baptizing only believers . In 1528, however, capito arrived at what might be considered the logical conclusion of Bucer ' s thinking . He publicly renounces the practice of infant baptism. Bucer is alarned. He is awakening to the dangers of the unchurchly sectarianism. Back to the drawing board 8ucer must 90 again . 11as there sanething he was missing? Relying on Zwingli , perhaps, 9Jcer oow advocates for the connection between baptism and circum::::ision. Surely our children are no less entitled to convenantal i nclusion than any Jewish (:Erson . 'Ihe grace offered in the Old Testament times can never be diminished. Baptism is a mcxle by which we are recognized as O1ristians and included tn the nurture and diSCipline of the congregation. This seems to be the origin of Bucer's concept of the ~ection between baptism, parental resfXlllSibility, and Otristian aiucation. No (:Erson who knows him or her self to be righteous will deprive a child of, or delay the receiving of these benefits. ~gtism, ''while fOUl"¥:ied 00 God ' s word, is a blessed, 11 ving, and po.verful thing. " EVen so, if we are to push B.lcer's secorrl stage to its conclusion logically, baptism would still be little IlOre than a pl easant human ceremony. Bucer eventually caJre to recognize this fact ~ aa:uts ~t his. ~lie: work on this subject was not always satisfactory. His floal , distingUlshed thought cauprehending baptism as death and resurrection, can be attributed to his 1rN"Il t v tn P"Itri .c;t.i.c .c;tudies . his exeaesis of Paul's eoistle to the Ranans and T. JiOI,,1 can water and the outward word, with ~~i<:h ~ptiS! n is given , regenerate people, renew them ,with the Holy Splnt , .In?Jrporat7 t~ in O1rist, clothe them with him, and make them partlCl. pators 1n hlS death? . d . C 0Jr Lord Jesus Olrist, our high pnest an saVlOur, acts and a~lIpliShes all this through his Holy spirit . . rle uses for it the ministry of the church, in a.Jtward words and Slgns. 1herefore they are called sacraments and mysteria, that is holy secrets--that while one thing happens inwardly through the power rfIf Olrlst, one sus aD:)ther outwardly in the ministry of the church. In his Q:tth:iltary on the Rarans , Bucer ootes the sacramental dialogue between objective Grace and how it is subjectively received. He writes: WithcJut any qualification Paul can call our baptism 'the washing of regeneration, ' and describe all ...mo have been baptized as buried with Otrist and clothed with Olrist. For baptism was instituted to present this regeneration and this cxmnunion in Ou"ist, and no one who receives baptism will in fact lac§9 them unless he refuses to accept them because of his o.m unl::elief. 'Ihls is the theology which is professed in his 1537 and 1539 Strassburg liturgies which includes pointed questions for the godparents aOO. the deliberate use of the Apostle ' s Creed. Am, this is the theol ogy which caused him to declare to the Anglicans at the end of his life a t cambridge that he hoped that the place of baptism, "the greatest sacranlent mig~5 be restored" and that churchly devotion to it may be pr eserved and increased. NEVIN 00 BAPTISM Infant baptism had beca,M: unfashionable in the mid-nineteenth century due to general apathy. Parents, especially in the Congregational, Presbyterian, and Dltch Reformed cx:mnunions saw no urgency aOOi.lt the subject because the theology had becalM: so hazy . Baptism had traditionally been aaninistered to infants in these church txxiies. Grace, ~ver, was no longer understood to be a factor explicitly and salvation was not camected to the act directly. Therefore, the for baptism was not generally Clarles Hodge reports in the that in the Presbyterian were baptized for every 1,000 carmunicant . • In 1856, ho.Iever, that number had dropped to only 5gT O::Ilgreqatic:aal:J.sts and [)jtch Reforned re(X)ct even fewer poople parti cipating. Nevin w~ reacting to this "Baptist" trend. In his article entitled "Neel en Baptism, Nevin concurs with the Baptist conclusion that there is no scriptural mandate for, no scrip~ural examples clearly given, no historical evidenCe in the first three centU:les found for the practice of infant baptism. Is there, then, any justificahc:r:t for the practice continuing? Nevi n believes that there .i s . The answer hes not in the let ter of scripture but in the life of Christl.anity itself. His r easoning is consi s t ent with his understanding of I sacraments . He teaches: A sacrament i n the true church sense is not a mere outward rite, made oblig<;,-tcry by divine apPOintment. It carries in itself a peculiar ccnstitut ion of i t s own . I t oonsists, according to the ol d = inition, of two parts, one outward and the other inward a visible r ene sign and an invisible celestial grace; not r elated simply as 14 • corresponding facts, brought together by huma., thought; but the one actually bound to the other in the way of the lrost real mystical or sacramental union, causing the last to be objectively at hand in one and the same transaction with the first. Dissolve this mystical bond, an:j at once the ol d conception of a sacrarrent is gone at the s~ne ti:ue. You may still retain a rite or ceremony which you dignify w~th this venerable name; but you will not have what the Qlurch, frern the beginning, has understccd. herself 6'2 possess in the holy mysteries of baptism and the lord ' 5 supper. 'lll.erefore, if we are to view baptism not as a mere human ordinance but as a divinely instituted sacrament the act can not t:e totally contingent upon individual learning. To bar such a significant portion of our p:::>pulation fran Orristian fellowship and benefits solely because they are as yet, "incapable of any real ccmprehension in the kingdan of Gcd , or the new life of Olrist in the Olurch, is. in truth to turn the fact of Orrist himself into a Glostic phantom. " bJ \I'hat is this Grace which is then presumed in the sacrament of baptism? I·that does it acccmplish? Is it necessary for salvation? In 1850 Nevin is still a bit uncertain. He conch.:des his article on "Noel on Baptism" by saying: He know that there are great difficulties attending the subject of baptismal grace . But let us not think. to esca~ these, by throwing ourselves into the arms of Rationalism. \'lhether ....'e can solve them satisfactorily or not, we are still oound, in t.he way of preliminary faith, to accept the mystery of such grace itself; since the only alternative to this, is to give up the doctrine of the holy sacraments al~ther, in the old church sense, and so to bring in MOther gos~l. Curiously, tEvin makes little reference to Calvin on this subject. He ~ not resolve the tension between baptism aoo election that Calvin leaves. His refusal to utilize the cirCl..llOC:ision analogy (Calvin ' s favorite theme) indicates Nevin's view of its inadequacy. TIle Orristology is just too hazy . How might one understand baptismal regeneration? Baptism itself does not guarantee a person salvation. As with the Eucharist, faith is again the condition for receiving. But this is not to say that Baptism is not a sacrament i nvolving Gcd ' s direct intervention. He that believes and is baptized, the Apostolical comU.ssion runs, shall be saved. Faith is sutmission to the new order of life supernaturally offered in the Ol.urch; and its proper canplerrent is the heavenly reality of his grace itself, meeting it as Gcd ' s act aoo seal in the laver of regeneration . Baptism in such view is of course as the old creeds have it, "for the remission of sins." It is a real translation f rem the sphere of truth and grace, the full possil?~lity of righteousness and eternal life, which is revealed in Orrist. nus is probably one of John Nevin's strongest staterrents about the sacramental p::104er in baptism. Lest it be misinterpreted as accanplishing sane sort of magic, tEvin emphasizes the necessary role of Olristian Education . The seed of faith with which a child is blessed at the time of the sacrament must be nurtured to grow via the system of the catechism. Baptism is rut the beginning of the road to salvation. Baptism requires, at sane point in the person's 15 " t" 67 rite a f con f ~rma ~on. life, a faithful affirmatioo in the gain Bucer's influence is evident. Bucer is believed to be the ~~ oc;: :vangelical confirmatioo. He saw ~firmatioo as th~ subjective resp::nse to the objective grace ~tcM:!d ~n the 5acraJle!lt of baptism. __ '" ti does not canplete bapt~sm. '!he baptisrrul act ~s conplete as it '.. UU.L~nna on th ~-" t" rucer' s doctrine of the church stems directly from his wKlers tanding of the Ellchari stic mystery. I Corinthians 10: 16-17 is the essence of ~ ' s uOOerstanding of DJcharistic efficacy. 'Iba cup of blessing whic h we bless, i s it not the participation in the blcx::d of Qu ist? 'nle bread which we break, is it not participation in the bcxiy of Olrist? Because there is Ole bread, we who are many are one bcxiy, for we all partake of the one bread. What is Bucer saying? He is saying that through the crnmunion in the txx1y of O1rist the Church is formed. '!he Church, therefore is an organic extensioo of the Saviour' s life. We who are lrenbers of the Olurch are members by virtue of cur birth (rreaning baptism) and our nurture (in the Hard and in the EUcharist) into O1rist. We are rot mambers l:::::ause of our righteous acts, oor by passing a test, nor by our accullplishrrents, or by our deliberate choosing. It is not, as so nany Protestants believe tOOay, our rrerit or our gracious decision. We are members of the O1urch because we are ingrafted into it. Bucer explains in his "Lectures on Ephesians:" But since by far the greatest unity and oneness is that exist ing between the members of O1rist, they are gathered into one by divine action, through the Spirit of God and not by any natural or political affinity, then the ~y they form is much more appropriately called 6~ body ' in which Olrist lives and which itself lives in Olrist. What are the marks of the true Q1Urch? The Olurch listens to the voice of the ~~ . It conducts a ministry of education. It is guided by suitabl e IlIllUSters . It ~wfully di7penses the sacraments. And, it exhorts thos70in the fellCMShip. ~_ hve a Olr ~st-like life of holiness and righteousness . \I'here is there LCXXu for controversy and division? \·fI1ere is the place for privately ~ mass or individualizatioo? \'lho has the right to use the Sacrarrent as a rrag~cal hoax or as a violent weap:n? lhrity love obedience and education must be obvi . the ", f ous 10 Church. '!hos, as was stated before the strassbUI"'g Re OrIDer gives his life for the sake of ecumenism. ' '!he IlI)re he becalTe f ' li " " thO threat of ~. arm. ar w~th them, the roore Bucer carre to recoglUZe ttr cti sectanaru.sm. The pious nature of the sects can make them SE ::, very ~a it ~s ~liea~ ntnbers of faithful persons. But sects are ~ ~iving. is no a acia .sa~d am done sects offer nothing bJt personal p~ etls.'n . 'nlete is no ~ f:C: = for ~ power of Otrist in the churchly system . 'Ib~ a.rgment wi th the to umte and no value given to the sacraments . aucer sects (especially wi th the Schwenkfelder separatists) was '6 that they set themselves up as the ultimate judges of the faith. They are absolutely sure of the truth of their Otm set of beliefs. 'lll.us they are COOSlJlred with self pride and vanity. They claim that the scriptures are their sole authority bJt interpret the scriptures as they please. Their u;lsacrarrental nature denies Olrist any real ability to save. I nstead salvation i s gauged according t o the individual ' s achievements in the faith. Also, the civil disobedience practiced by these groups was diamet.t;ically opposed to the Bucerian concept o f the cooperation of Onrrch and State. In 1523 BJ.cer dntt: sa the pretentious nature of the medieval church of Fane as the "Antichrist" because of +is attempts to replace the gospel with its om system o f grace or disgrace. Later he deduced that the sectarians -ff'Uld be just as dangerous and satanic as the notor i ously evil medieval clergy. NEIJIN " S J:lX"[,E$IOrJX;'i : av:er ' s staterrent about the Antichr ist is very interesting te::ause Jolm Nevin would CCUi!! to conclude rruch the sane. 'lhe spirit of sect, wherever it may prevail, involves ne:::essarily a false view of the person of Christ, and is utterly inccmpatible thus with sound Christian orthodoxy. As a spirit at ooce of heresy and schism, in this way, we pronounce it to be emphatically the Antichrist of the Clurch in our own tin'e . So far ~4its power goes , i t is at war with the whole fact of the Incarnation. Nevin 's list of the ills o f the sects seems to be an expansion of BJcer' s OOservatiCXlS with one excepticn; there is no rrcnticn of civil disnh-iJ1ence. This s i mpl y did not apply to Nevin ' s historical-p:::!litical situatioo. other than that, the two lists tightly fit. Nevin says that for the sects : (1) salvation is subjective. (2) The mystery of the Person of Olrist is underrated . (3) There is no sense of the Clurch ' s supernatural consti tuticn. (4) 'nlere is a l~ view of ministry and the sacraments. (5) A con~ for history and authority is blatant. (6) There is an over affection for individual ftee-'on. (7) There is a terrlency to hyperspiritualism. (8) Their view of the IrX)rld is laced with dualism. (9) Unchecked by the objective, worship can lead to fanaticism. (10) The end result is conti nuous division . (11 ) The system rests on inconsistent. and ~Seady pietism. (12) Their theology is false or nonexlStent. Nevin offers an antidote to the infectious sectarian spirit. In order to redeem such heretical notioos there must be a revitalizatioo of the creedal dcx::trine of the Clurch as being Q1e, Holy, catholic, and ApostoliC in its very essence.7b In other words the Clurch is not just a voluntary association of the like-minded organized to accomplish sane stated task. '!he Ol.urch is an object of our faith and reverencp.. It is a supernatural creation fran the tirre of the Incarnation. Since the tirre o f the Ascension, the Clurch continues Olrist's IrX)rk of r ecalCiliation and rrediaticn . It is the channel of Grace . The grace which starts in Olrist's birth, and flows CIlward through his life, his death upcn the cross, his descent into hades , his resurrection, his ascensicn to the right hand of God , and the sending 17 of the Holy Qlost, is the same that then .discharges i ts full stream into the bosem of the Olurch, an~ that lS poured f~Jr ~ fran ~is again in the benefits of redemptlon, frem the. renu.SSlon of Slns ward to the life ever lasting. Beyond a ll questlOl1, the Creed means : affinn the being of the Clurch, a.s an jndispensabl e link in the heme of salvation, and as sanething not accldental rrerely rut ~sential to the constitution of Christianity . In this view, it defines itself and fixes its Of) attributes. It is necessarily one, holy, catholic, and apostolical. Is there any substantial difference b:!tween Nevin's and Bucer's churchly theologi es? Not really. By way of distinction we may say that whereas Bucer's begins i n the Eucharist mystery and Nevin's in the Incarnation. But the fact that the Qlurch is the mapifestation of Christ's earthly cont ernporary Bcdy through which Grace is received for tot...'l of these saints is priJnary. Al1l'HCRIT'f : Sola Scriptura, we are taught, was the key phrase of the Reformation. 'Ihrough rediso::wering the scriptures the Reformation Fathers rediscovered the Gospel's rreaning. I t was in the scriptures that they found that the Olurch of the Ap::>stles was nowhere close to the church of their experience. It was in the scriptures that they learned the Table of the Lord was not the sacrifice of the ~lass. It was in the scriptures that the Refonners got a new I OJk at the role of the laity and the place of ordination. It was in the scriptures that these revolutionary preachers unearthed the doctrine of Justification. Ole can not overstate the importance of the writ ten 1·lord when sp€!aking of what it means to be a Protestant. Martin Bucer would be finnly in line with this tradition. He defended the primacy of the written .. lord over and over again. The Scriptures must be authoritati~e at all times, Bucer insisted. Thj~ can not be shoved to the side when convenlent as had been the Reman practice. l-Je can easily find the scriptural bases for most all of the refonns that Bucer was intrcducing. The Bible, in Bucer's mind, is the work of the Holy spirit. If ale is in the Spirit, one \~ill be able to interpret it. If a person, hcweve:, does no~ possess. the. Spir.it jtfe int erpretation may be fruitless. The authorlty of Scnpture lles ln this. However, Bucer is not what the rrodern would reo::qnize as a Biblical literalist. He ~lccxnes innovation which had no explicit Bible precedence. As long as it did not conflict with the Biblical text, Bucer would generally pennit it. I~e can see this in his defense of the practice of infant baptism and in worship traditions. Bucer states: The warning they cite against adding to or subtracting frem the words of the Lord rreans , as everyone recognizes that no decision or a~5ion is to be taken contrary to the Lord's will expounded in the l aw. A se:x>nd ~rinciple which walld take him out of the literalism camp is that ~~ beheved contemporary interpretation and the i nterpr e tations of the . Fathers (as canpared to the church of the New Test.arrent) should be C~lstent . Bucer ~sured hie;; Biblical exegesis according to the patriS~ i C ~e ~n~ . He studied the Patristic literature as a student of the S1fist1afl ~s ~G08nt . And, he was rather well versed in their thinking. use of orc Fathers in i tself was not tmusual in the Reformation period. seccni 18 ally to the rediscovery of Scripture, this was the major influence. aK:er, however, seems to have carried his veneration of the saints of the church considarably further than did his colleagues. Calvin once scolded him: You are constantly asserting the authority of the Fathers in this fashion, but en this basis any falsehocd you like can be represented as the truth. Is this the true hallOHing of God's narre, to ascr~~ so !TUch weight to man that his truth no longer holds sway (;Her us? l'ihy did Bucer hold firm in this position? Bucer refused to deny the authority of ' holy antiquity ' and the consensus of the faithful camrunity throughout the centuries . He continually tried to find a line. of revelatory truth which ran throughout all of ch.urch ltistory. While acknowledging periods of ap:>stasy (such as the Scholastics) , Bucer rever failed to believe the Spirit of God was at work in the Olristian camrunity. Serre have accused Bucer of using the Patristics in his i r enical zeal to charm the Ranan Catllolics . l'lhile , of course he used this as a pjint of colIIonality in the Protestant--Catholic discussions , Bucer' s Patristic interest continued both before and after them. His Patristic interest is partially a result of his Humanistic education. This is certainly his intrcxh.iction but it does not account for its prevalence. D. F. Wright came to this conclusial which. Ile jOOg'es may be ' unhistorical idealism. ' '!hus the daninant rotif in Bucer ' s appeal to the Fathers (which embr aced, of course, the lmole paraphernalia of the early Ol.urch, such as canonical requlations , minister ial structures, and liturgical practices) is this idea of a primitive Pll'e and Ort.ho"'<,.K consensus which has been the focus of a continuing consensus in every century and offers the hope of ~3re<::ov ery of roth pure orthcxioxy and catllolic concord in the present. 'lhe theory sounds incredibly like nc:ne other than John Nevin and Philip Schaff and their theory of hlstorical progression! It ShCMS us why Bocer felt grateful for the Ol.urch ' s traditions. 'Ihere i s roe rrore rule in his understanding of Biblical interpretation. In the Bucer recuiiiends that candidates for the ministry be the Scriptures contain all that is necessary for salvatiro. 1hey are then asked if they will teach the Scriptures aco " ding to the Olurch ' s catholic cDct.rinal ccnfessi~. By this he rreans according to the I\postles', Nicene, and Atilanasian cree1s . Thus the Creeds interpret the Scriptures as the Scriptures interpret the creeds . As early as 1537 Bucer insisted on the use of the creed in his Lord' s Days liturgies and in the Baptismal service especially. We might conclude, therefore, that Bucer would nwrber the Scriptures, the Spir it, Tradition, and the CI ccns all among his sources of authori ty . NEVIN AND Al1l'HORIT'l: As a Hebrew scholar, Nevin was second to none in his Biblical respect and kno..>ledge . He took gust pains to appeal to the Scriptures in his theological writings. However, Nevin ref used to give the Bible ultimate authority. For this he was chastised severely and accused of Rananizing ten:lencies . 19 Nevin's hermeneutic \.;as an outgcCMth of his understanding of Incarnat e history. '!he essentials of the Faith, Nevin believed .~re apprehended, preserved, and sed on in the earliest Olristian carrmm1be s long before t1atthew, ,1ark, ~e and John were in written fOl1n , let alone canonized and p.iblished. The core' of the Faith "Jesus is Lord," \.;as revelatory. This core of the Faith was given to Peter wh:an he opened his eyes and reco:Jl1ized in Jesus "'!he Orrist." It is on the rock of Peter ' s confessioo that the Olurch has l:x3en placed. Frcm this core the creed grew organically. Thus : The Creed was no product of ref lection, no result of consultation, no \ The Bible, on the other hand, was inspired by the Holy Spirit undoubtedly. But it was written, redacted, collected, anj blesse::l by those Imo lived in an already existent Faith context. 'Therefore one can not interpret the Scriptures ex nihil or in a vacuum. Individual interpretation leads to the Scriptures' misuse. Just about anything can be proven. 'The Olurch and the Creed must be consulted each and every time that we read the Holy Ecok . 'Ihe coning of the Holy Ghost was not in order to the publication of the Holy Scriptures primarily, but in order to the founding of the Holy catholic Olurch. For the · thinking of the Early Christian worl d, therefore , it was not possible to place the Bible before the Omrch in the order of faith. 'Ihe Olurch was for them a fact deeper and wider and nearer to the proper life of Christianity, than the Bible. Not any feelings of disrespect for the Bible of course, and not fran any doubt of its being the inspired Hard of God, but because their sense of catfistianity was such as to require this order rather than the other. 'Therefore the Clurch was for Nevin an undeniable and an equal authority. W , this was not just the Olurch of the first century. Prot estants in the nineteenth cent ury attempted to disregard all of church history in favor of restoration to the New Testarrent cannunity. '!hiS, they believed was the Protestant heritage. 'nlis is one of the reasons Nevin explored the Reformation days. And, in the Reformation he discovered Patristics and an appreciation like Bucer's for Otristianity's lineage. Christianity, we say, is organic. This implies, in the nature of the case, developnent, e volution, progress. The idea of such a dev7"l~~t ~s not imply, of course, any change in the nature of Chr1stiamty 1tself. It implies just the contrary. It assumes that the system is. CClUplet7" in its CJIom nature fran the beginning, and that the whole of 1t too, ~s canprehended in the life of the OIurch at all p::>ints of its history. But the contents of this life need to te unfolded, theoretically and practically in the consciousness of the Clurch .. 'llti.s implies developrent. In' its very constitution the Olurch :uoplles a process which will bee canplete only Imen the ' new h~vens ' shall reflect in full image the new earth wherein dwelleth I r1ght~ness. And .still all this will be nothi ng more than the full evolut1OO of the . hfe that was in Christ fron the begiMing, and the full p::Mer of which has been always present in the church struggling ~~ ,~i l ages towards this last glorious 'manifestation of the son 20 • wright ma..y also. cal.l this i~cersburg philosophy '\mhistorical idealism." Granted, lt is ldeahsm. But 1S it not histor ic? Nevin arrl Bucer, I think, ~lOU ld argue just the opposite, for it is based on the Incarnatioo. C::I:T\JaI"ing Bucer's and Nevin's thought on authority ma.y se:m like a chicken and egg type o f discussion. Bucer bagan with the Scripture and the Spirit. Nevi n began with the <:Ieed and Tradition. Regardless of the starting point, roth acknowledged the t.mp:)rtance of all these factors in the end. NEVIN' S KNONLEr.X;E OF I3UCER What then can we say aOOut 11artin Buoer ' s influence on John Nevin? I believe that there is enough evidence to make the ma.tter worth investigating. 'Iheir theologies of the Olurch, the Sacraments , and authority are very close. Their zeal for ecumenical W"derstanding and liturgical renewal go hand in hand. MId, it is not unreasonable to asSUJTe a continuous traditioo through the German camection. But, we I'lUSt ask, " ~lhat did Nevin k;no.I aOOut Bucer the man?" Originally Nevin knew practically about him. t>/hen Nevin wrote his great discourse on the Eucharist, in which he reviews Reformed and Patristic theology, He is aware that BK;er requested that the Firs t Confession at Basel be published showing that the Swiss believed in a EUcharistic Presence to SQ~ extent. And , Nevin cites Bucer' s role along ~th Luther, as a judge of the ortho:::ldoxy of the First Helvetic Confession. But other than that he is silent. Nevin finnly believed at this point that his llicharistic theology of the Real Presence was JOOst accurately ascri bed to Calvin. In fact the extended title of Mystical Presence is : A vindicaticn of the Refonred or Calvinistic I:bctrine of the Ellcharist. In April o f 1848 Nevin's fanner professor at Princeton, Clarles Hodge , tried to take him to task . His purpose was to prove that the Mystical Prmence is l'iI::PNhere near the Reforned Dcctrine of the El..icharist and that it is certainly not Calvinist. Hodge wrote in an article in the Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review that Nevin : attributes to Calvin a \«ong psychology in reference to Olrist ' s person . . . And what is that but saying his awn views differ fran those of Cal vin .. .. And : Nevin says calvin was wrong not only in the psychology of Chri st but of his people. An1 : Dr . Nevin ought surely to s top quoting calvin as in any \~ay abetting the IOOflStrous doctrine , that under the old dispensation, God was ooly revealed to his people , whi l e under the new, the divine nature is united in them with the h\.lTlall nature, as in Christ ••• in the way of a progressive i ncarnation • . •'Ihi s doctrine calvin, as ' Professor Hedge blamed Nevin ' s theological strayi ng on the influence of the Germans . His article created quite a sti r as we might imagi ne. Nevin set to work to ref ute him. 'ltle debate raged for years. " Shortl y after Hodge ' s publicaticn ,the German his torian Ebrard praluoed [)as ~""W"hiCh provided the scholarl y ,<.; controversy of the Reformation. Nevin ate i t up arrl in the september , 850 issue of the printed the lxok ' s sumna.tion. Here for the first time allowing) Bucer canes to the hod zon , 'the StrassOOrg j( in the Wittenberg Cbncord is given separate attentioo. Nevin ranks Bucer' work as "excellent. " He notes that the Strassburg divines were willing to take the middle ground between Lutheran and Zwinglian views alm::>st right fran the beginning. But he says that unfortunat ely Bucer had no clear insight into the real points of diffe rence between them and the true sense of the Refonnad p:>Sition as "inc1~g in fact a real advance o f the whole question to new and higher ground." In this rather hefty article Nevin also discusses Bucer' s Tetra(X?litana . In it Nevin firds: "that Quist is said to 91 ve in a sacrarrental mystery his true body and bl cx::d ' to be truly eaten and. drunk as the focrl and drink of sools by which they may be nourished to everlasting life. ' '!his at once raises the mystery distinctly into the ~e of the Spirit and oorresponds fully with the view o f calvin." 'Ihis is a major affirmation fran the critical eye of Dr. Nevin! Nevin did ~er , cOll uent that 8lx:er conducted well--aeaning but poorly conducted ne~tiatioos . \"Alat therefore can we concllrla arout Nevin' s familiarity with Bucer? Nevin was privileged to witness Arrerica ' s first taste of the man. . In 1850 Wi] terform the Angli~ recognized BJcer's hand in the Liturgy of Cblogne in his Treatise on Baptism. In 1856 Preoes Ecclesiasticae: '!he Form o f Public Devotioo Instituted by calvin, John Knox, Martin 8rer , Micronius etc. was p.ililis~. I t states in the preface that Bucer was a ,flearned disciple of Calvin. II Charles Baird used Nevin arx1 Ebrard as a reference when he pJblished i n 1855 and until 1860. this was in Gennan language. ) was to t:lecafe Philip source to BuCer in his volmes 00 Perhaps i f Nevin had been introduced to Bucer earlier; perhaps if he had had access to lI"Ore of his wri tings ; perhaps if he had not t::n forced to defend his all egiance to calvin he would have made oore of this connection Nevin was too precise in his own scholarship to make any hasty decisions .' For the t:irnE! M i ng, he WQ.lld stand by his calvinistic p::>sition. With the help of Ebrard he softell" d sane of his f ormer c r iticisms. "n1e examination of BuCPr, Nevin, and the German RefoI med tradition is certainly not Ctiiiplete. 'n"le bulk of Bucer' s writings are not yet available to be studied in En]lish. 'Ihere i s etlCAIgh evidence, in my est imation to make the search worth continuing. ' 22 1. D. F. wright (Sutton Courtnay Press, Appleford, 2 . Bard 'lbctnpsoo (World Publishing 00. Cleveland Strassburg liturgy of 1539 see 'Ihanpson pp. 159ff 3 . see ~1i1liam D. Maxwell Bo:lk (Faith Press, 4. James Hastings Nichols (I'lestminster Press, 5 . Maxwell, p. 11 8 6. Luther, /·\elanchthoo, Justus Jooas, Jdlannes Brenz, casper Cruciger, Arrlreas Osiarder, Zwingli, Johannes Brenz, casper Cruciger, Andreas OSiarder, Zwingli , Johannes Oe::olampadius, &leer, WOlfgang capito, Johannes sturm all were in attendance . 7. Hastings Eells, Martin Eucer (Yale University Press, New Haven, 1931) p. 201 •• wright, p • 31 •• wright, p. 44 10. Wright, p. 39 11. O:nstantin Hopf (Basil , Blackwell, Oxford 1986) p. were but not annihilated militarily by Olarles V in the Smalkald he tried to secure the peace by demanding Protestant a llegi ance to a SO called conpronise theological staterrent. Although the doc::uJrent oonoeded clerical marriage am camrunioo with both elements , it was clearl y ~ranising in its Ronan polity and doctrine. O\arles expected BU('Pr's cooperation. He refused at the risk of his very life am, as a r esult, was fOlced to leave Strassburg as a fugitive. 12. 13. Daniel Bard 'lbanpsoo. 14 . Poll, p . 145 AIrong these publications were the Psalter, the cot",entary to the t:o:>k of RatIans , and the ApoUgia de S . Cbena Domini. 1S . Ibid . 16 . wright, p . S2 23 17. 18. Luther is quoted in 1541 as saying "Bucer, the rascal, has absolutely lost all my confidence. I shall never trust him. He has betrayed me too often." Hastings Eells "'nle Failure of O1urch unification Efforts fUring the German Reformation. " .:.rchiv Fur Reformations Geschichte. (1 951 ) p. 166 19. Lorna Jane !\bray 28 20. Ibid. , p. 157 21. Wilhelm Pauck, editor, !-'.elanchthon and Btlcer: 'Ih.e Library of O'.ristian Classics Vol. XIX (501 Press, London, 1969) p. 170 22. Ibid., p. 172 23. see James Kittelson's excellent article entitled "Martin Bucer and the sacramantarian Controversy: The origins o f his Policy of Concord" Archlv fur Reformatioosgeschichte (1973) pp 166-183 In i t he writes : Bucer was therefore neither a fool nor a knave i n his search for concord h~ver willing he was t o wink at dis crepancies between the various refollLed doctrine s abJut the e l errents. Rather, his work for wtity grew naturally frern his understanding of the eucharist as camrunion o r fell 24. See Jdm 1'1. Nevin Yf~~, (papers of the Eastern Chapter, ~ Reformed Church No. I Lancaster Penna. 1964) pp. 50-56 25 . Nevin ' s dilerrma was aggravated by the theologi cal controversy bet ween the Old SChcol and New School Presbyterian bodies and the Nl"erican questioo of slavery. See Ibid., pp 86ft. 26. Nevin, My am Life p. 150 27. Of particular influence was and aesthetics. See: James Hastings Nichols Schaff at MercersWrg. niVerg p. 46- 47 28. Althou~ this Liturgy created t.remarrlous controversy at the time, it revolutionized. the worship practices of the Genran Refotuw Church in 1In'erica canpletely. To this day official liturgies of '!be United Olurch of Olrlst, the descendent denanination of the Genran RefotlCed Church (a rrerger with Puritan O::>ngregationallst, ironically) remain unquestionably in this heritage. 24 • 29. '!he German Reformed Olurch merged with the Evangelical conmunion in 1936 and then again with the <:algregational Olristian churches in 1957 to form the united Olurch of Olrist. 30. James Hastings Nichols at ~~cersburg 31 . John I'lilliamson 32. Ibid. , p. 54 (Notice that the title of the Mystical Presence seems to equate "Reformed" with "calvinistic" doctrine.) 33. MercerSburg Review (september 1850) p . 457 34. Abray, p . 41 35. Bard Thanpson 36. Hopf, p. 92 37. Hopf, p. 97 38 . Poll, p. '" 39. Kittelson, p. 178 40 . Wright, p. 388 41. W.P. Stephens The Holy Spirit in the 'I11eology of Martin Bucer (cambridge University Press, Cambridge , 1970) p. 254 42. E.C. Whitaker Martin Bucer and the S:x>k of O::xtttOO Prayer (Alcuin Club, Mayhew- l4cCrimnon, Great \~akening, 1 974) p. 76 43 . \~ilhelm Pauck, Editor Classics vol. XIX ( 44 . Gordon E. Pruett, "A Protestant D:x::trine of the Eucharistic Presence." calvin Theological Journal (1974 ) p. 162 45. Kittelson, p . 177 46. John ~'Ji lliamson Nevin "Q) the Lord ' s supper" Mercersburg Review (18S0) p . 423 47 . See The Mystical Presence pp 118-126 for Nevin's discussion about the differences between Puritan thought and Refonnation heritage. 48. Ibid., p. 58 49. Ibid. 50. Ibid. , p. 229 51. Ibid., p. 220 52. In 1528 capito flatly rej ects the do.::t.rine o f infant baptisrn. A.t this p:lint we see Bucer taking a second look at his previously held positicn. Van De Poll, p. 95 53. Van De Poll, p. 44 54. stephens . p. 224 (Fran Grund Urrl Ursach, 1524) 55 . Van De Poll, p. 97 56 . stepyms, p . 228 (Gltachten 1529 ) 57 . su.p/>ens , p. 232 58 . su.p/>ens , p. 230-231 59. wright, p. 298 60. Whitaker, p . 86 61. ClIarles Hodge "Neglect of Infant Ba.ptism" Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review (January 1857) p. 91 62 . JOOn Nevin, "fb:>1 00 Baptism" 'Ibe ~burq Review (May 1850) p. 243- 244 63, John Payne " Nevin and the sacrament of Baptism" 'nle New MercersOO.rg Review (Autumn 1986) p . 36 64. Nevin, (1850) p . 265 65 . Payne . p. 42 66. Nevin, '!he Mercersburg Review (July 1852) p . 376- 377 67. Payne, p. 39 68. Van De Poll, p. 98 69. Wright , p. 204 70. Ibid. , p . 205 71. Miri am Usher Otrisman of Cllange (Yale I 72. 73. O1risman, p. 181 26 74. John Williamson Nevin (John S. Taylor, New York, 75. See Nevin, Antichrist, pP 47-68 76. Ibid., p. 83 77 . JdU1 Williamsen Nevin "Thoughts on the Church" The Mercersblrq Review (April 1858) p . 193 78 . 'Ihat1pson, Liturgies of the Western Omrch, p . 162 79 . Step"ens, p . 155 80. \'lright, p. 303 (fran Bucer ' s culi\entary on Ranans) 81 . Hughes Oliphant Old 'Ille Patristic Roots of RefOlUed Worship (Theologische Verlag, Zurich 1970) p. 130 82 . wright, p. 40 (From a letter of Calvin to Bucer, January 12, 1538) 83. Ibid. , p . 41 84 . Whitaker , p. 180 85 . Nevin, Antichrist, p . 28 86. Nevin, The !-1ercersblrg Review, p. 192 87 . Nevin, The Arrerican Catholic Q.Jarterly Review (Volume III) p. 171 88. Nevin, The Mystical Presence, p. 66 89 . Olarles tbdCJO! , "Doctrine of the RefolILe.l O'IUrch on The IDrd ' s SUppar" The Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review, April 1848, pp. 265-269 90 . Nevin, "'!he Doctrine of the Refonood Olurch on the IDrd ' s suppar" '!be MercersWrg Review (September 1850), p. 463 91. Ibid. , p. 464 92 . True Catholic (Baltimore 1850) p . 538 93 . Preces Ecclesiasticae: '!he Fonns of Public [:evotion Instituted by Calvin, JdU1 Knox, Martin fbrer, Micronius and other Presbyterian Divines Adapted and used in Various Branches of the Presbyterian 01Urch (Schribner, New York, 1856) , p . 3 27 AS FIRM AS ASHES: A SfR.(}j Preached by CCl::x>rah Rahn Clemens a t Lancaster Theological Seninary Ash \·.'edncsday, February 24, 1993 for the I/.ercersburg Society l1atthew 6:1-6, 16-21 If there ever was one, Los Angeles might well be knr;:o..m as a truly Alrerican city. Growing up 00 the Pacific coast it stands as a witness that the pioneer danination of a raw untamed continent was finally canplete. Los Angeles is not saddled with Old \'Iorld i nfluences as our cities are in the East. It is truly of American making : rrodern buildings, trend setting, sun shining, surf Ix>arding, Hollywocd dazzling, pizazz. The fads generated by its people sweep across not only our country but much of the world with lightning speed. Let New York be damned . Los Angeles reigned as the indisputable capital of capitalism, the undeniable release of freeJaiL, the undoubted vision of optimism, and the fizz of the Pepsi generation . 'Ihat is, until the jury ~n the Rodney King beatings trial handed down its decision . AM the shock that shook us was rivaled only by the horror f elt by the hell that broke Q.lt when America ' s favored city turned into a battle grourd. ~ streets lx!caJ1"e seas of Leviathan. 'Ihe stores became hoards for looting. The hones became pyres for torching . And, human beings became dogs fit for bl udgeoning . Sifting through the ashes of this ooce great city, our nation knew it had exchanged a nightmare for the American dream. The 1992 riots symtolized the disintegration of the legal system which built us constitutionally; the collapse of an economic systan which ~ trusted would make us all wealthji the failure of a civil rights era prophesying black and white hann::nYi and the loss of faith in humankind, the very core of demcx:racy. For here ~ saw ourselves as little more than thinly disguised beasts. Standing in the smoldering Li' ash heap, America faced the greatness of her sin and misery . ------A little while ago you ca'lle forward to allow ashes to be placed upa'l your foreheads, willingly! Did you really consider what it was that you were doing? Did you stop to ask. what this ritual is accomplishing? Did you kr\o.J you were rehearsing your very own funeral liturgy? "You are dust," the scripture reads, "and ashes is your destiny . " And the shovels du.'l1p their loads one by one until you are duly buried. 'Ihat was the promise, you k.now , given to Adam and Eve . After they pulled their pranks and scrambled to rank. themselves right up there with the Deity, and were exposed (in rrore ways than one) for who they had becOle : pathetic, gLeedy beings; and, as a result, ...-ere punished: forced to struggle to survive amidst broken relationships bringing new life only through pain and suffering . . . Ash was the P1.ulLise! Get that! D..1st to dust was the relief. For it \~as only " being hidden, consurred by the dark cool grmmd would they kno.~ an end to all their grief. I·Jhen you subnitted to the ashes , you acknowledged your part in our shared mortality. Still, you did more . By \~earing the ashes, you Me [raking a stat ement al::out our current reality. l'le live in a place full of hat red and l ust, abuse, and cruelty. l'le wur k in a nation being strangled "lith !XJllutants and retarded by dysf Wlctional families, and crushed under a rW1away econcmy. \'.'8 e xist in a world of SCrnalias and "what was once Yugoslavias" and endless \~ars i n the Middle East . Arrl it rubs off. Believe you Ire, it rubs off on even the m:>st protected, isolated, pristine. The soot, the filth, the garbage .. . each one of us has been contaminated by evil forces in our world. I'Je have been marked. \')e bear the scars in our souls. That is "Ihat these ashes mean. Just l:etween us, can I tell you? The truth is you l ook pretty silly . Did you know you've got a big black blotch right in the fuddle of your fore head? Looks like a third eye or sorrething. You may not even be aware of it, as the day goes on, fran what you can tell you look perfectly normal to yourself, perfectly respectable, maybe even perfectly perfect. But to everybody else you l ook perfectly dorky ! Like you were too lazy to wash your face ...men you got up this morning, or so dwnb you collided with a rubber stamp while walking. Fact is we are sin-ridden, everyone ; oozing with the very crimes against which we love to preach. And, those around us often see our awn imperfections long before we have any clue what they might be . And eVQI1 if vie are fully successf ul in masking our smut fran tho general public, G:xl. isn' t fooled! In the sight of the All Knowing One, every day we parade our sin (like the ash ) on our sleeve. So ...my in heaven ' s name \~OJ ld ....'12 want to mark the beginning of Lent in this way? Why would the Olurch create such a ritual of penance which i s so blatantly degrading? Don't ....'8 want to p..II11p up, not deflat e ourselves i n the Orristian cOlTmunity? I~ 're told in the 9th century, on the first day of Lent, in Frankish Gerrrany , slnner~ wuuld be herded together, dressed in sackcl oth , ashes ",oul d be smeared on the1r heads, then the pri est would take them by the hand and escort them f:art the church fran which they would be banned until ~1a. undy Thursday . In tlJlle, however, as rrore and !lOr e realized that if the Q1urch were to close its doors to sinners there would be no one l eft to worship the practice \~as disccntinued and the ashes were offered to everyl:xxly. ' ~ easier question than, "I' 29 that is in business making money taking the ashes of a cremated Ix:dy and sculpting them into a likeness of the face of the deceased . That ' s how far sore of us are willing to go to deny our QI.m inevitability. (I woooer how many of these will show up at yard sales eventually.) The nore we cling to our p::>ssessions, the less grasp we will have on the treasures in heaven . The more we trust in our Ol'/ll inventions , the less we know the wonders of creation. 'Ihe [fQre \-Ie believe in our own righteous deeds, the less and less of a Savior 1'Ie will think we need. But once \-Ie begin to realize the weight of our o.m sin and misery, then Gcd will reveal the greatness of the Divine Grace, caopassion, and eternal majesty. Knowing our sin is the first step towards true confort, according to the Heidelberg catechism. That ' s not because its authors were stodgy old "High Olurch" Gennans who took rrorbid delight in the practice of self-fl'Crtification. But it is because they knew one's got to name the illness before we can get a reuedy. And, they knew that though we stand under judgment, our accuser is hardly our enemy. And, they knew you and I belong, not because of anything we've done, but because Christ claims us as family . When you stand in f ront of the bathroom mirror later on, before you take a rag and scrub away the smudge, take a good look . Fix your eyes on the shape . You have been signed with the cross of Christi a syrn!;cl of yet one roore ash heap. It stood on a pile of dung, banished to the far side of the wallS of the Holy City. It's a place of death, humiliation, and pain known to us as Calvary. It is here that God opted to care confusing our sense of glory. It is here O"trist suffered and died so that finite and Infinite could meet. In Christ ' s death God destroyed the very last thing that separated us , that dust and ash of our roortality. In the cross, Christ gathers all that is and all that is no IOOre and ooIds a whole new reality . Every once in a while, during the LA riots, the newscasters 'wU.lld flash pictures of scrne jerk throwing a bucket of water on acres of flaming buildings. Even t If you chose to practice the Lenten diSCiplines of prayer and fasting and almsgiving , do so not because you will gain any spiritual brownie points by doing them. Do so only because these will help you focus on the Cross as the only source of our salvation. When you cane to the table today, cane knOoling that by drinking O"trist' s blood and eating His body you are lifted fran the ash heap of life and drawn to the Christ who s1 ts in glory. This is the rressage of Lent. AME N '0 Richard E. ~lent z Professor of Religious Studies Arizona State university Tenpe, Ari zcna It was difficult to be an American citizen during the firs t half of the nineteenth century and not be caught up in the swelling tides of American miss~oo and ~~fest ~ti~y . . Newspaper editorials waxed prophetic as they predicted ever lncreasUIg l.l1C1dents of revolutions in Ellrope. Expansi ooist sentiment suggested the United States assist in the birth of revolutions wherever monarchial reactionaries sought to destroy them. Alterican liberty and re(:X.lblicanism might even be exterrled to CUba, and all the West Indies. "Asia had her day," said the "Europe has had hers : and it remains to be seen first be worn by the new world before it reverts again 1966:199). Others said we should remain aloof frem the actual struggles of EUrope, standing aside as "the reserve corps to consmmate the triUlII(J1S of ire: h," ready to serve if liberty called us to arms. In 1848 "the fulfillment of Dastiny was delayed by / 'lhe revolutions in Europe were themselves evidence of a stirring of the liberty and equalit y that American represented . Drawing upcn Montesquieu ' s m:del of rep..lblicanism , Robert Bellah has suggested that the principle of social life for a republic is virtue (Bellah 1975: 23) . Presunably every society is constituted by a set of icieas, values, beliefs, and practices that reflect its percepticn of reality. As the poet Wallace stevens expressed it: "~/e live not so IIl.lch in a world as a perceptioo of the world. " Perception gives expression to those characteristics that constitute a society. 'Ibe oonstituticn of a rep..lblic is nurtured by a p3rception of the world in which ccmnun1ty is internally nourished by virtue, its carmitrtents, and its renewals . During the tiste of the American Revolution and the revolutionary ferment of the 18405, . the COOStitutloo of EUropean and American society was in the process .of ~cal alteration. Perceptioo of the world was changing, and the oonstl.tuUon of society was less ccncerned with hierarchical and authoritarian values. 'Ibe way was increas ingly open to republican virtue. Rumblings begun in the s ixteenth century had increased. in velocity and~ until, in the eighteenth century, the Great Awakening Sl.gnalrghd~ aMed a of an old order and the birth of a rew. '!be Arrerican En ': uman reason t.ouch of confidence to the new or der, suggesting that unaSSl.sted h as self o:",ld sort rut the proper constitutioo o f the t Een in evident truth (Gaustad 1982:5, 37-38),. Arrl ~e . htenment posture, There may the making fourd itself canfortable Wlth this D'lllg rut the minds of the have t en certain theological differences between the i~ting (Mead:S5-S6) . people were impatient with tedious i ntellectual hairsp 1 31 Of not veryooe was convinced that a new order, a Tle\~ constitution was be'~~ I~ was easy to see signs of chaos and disorder without co~pondi~ evidence of new birth. sectarianism, much of it the r~ult of the new revivalism, was very IlllCh in evidence. I,n her study o f ~brnoru.sm as a new religiOUS traditioo, Jan Shipps calls atten,t1oo to the unsettl,e? character of ArTerica during the Natiooal Period and 1nto the second thud of the nineteenth century. '!here was a new ph~si~al w:uvcrse , evi dent in the exparrling frontier and in the minds of matenallsts llke Thcmas Jefferson: ]I. new arrl sanewhat uncertain political system existed and America.'1S had to operate within it. '!he bases of social order were i n a state of disarray, and as a result of the nation ' s having cut its ties with England and her history, a clear lack of grounding in the past was evident. Quite clearly as important in the breakdcP.m of a once reasonably stable OJgtlitive and normative edifice of knowledge and understanding of the way things are was the uncertainty that was the Oltgrowth of the developllent of skepticism, on the one hand, and direct contentioo aITOlY:!' systeu'CS of theology and doctrine, 00 the other. 'lbat uncertainty placed in jeopardy the religious dynamic that f or centuries--through formal or informal catechizing--had passed from ooe generation to the next a body of unquestioned information about destiny , humanity, the system o f r ight relationships that created the social order, and the nature of experience after death. (Shipps: 34 ) . '''Ibe religiOls dynamic" to which Shipps refers was a major (X)Otributor to the constitutim that had made the new nation possible. As Henry F. May has expressed it: ''The Le¢O'Iery of Arrerican religious history has restored a ~1edge of the mode , even the language, in which IOClSt 1urericans, during IOOSt of American history, did their thinking about human nature and destiny" (67). 'l1ti.s "mode" ard "language" (constitution) were a "combination of evangelical Protestantism with American nationalism, with its Enlightenment roots and its ranantic flowering" (171). As sore nineteenth century thinkers , such as Orestes Brownson, were astute enough to recognize, it had been the constitution of the colonial enterpdse--the o:mstHutioo of images , attitudes , ideas, and values--that made the Ccnstitution a 'WOrkable document (Brownson:473-474). And T'O;l the r eligious dynamic and constitutioo were experiencing er05ioo. '!be ferrrent symptanati c of the revolutions of Dlror;e was also evident in America . Although this was a tima o f nationalism and ccntinentalism, as Hud.scn has shown us, it was also a time o f uncertainty. It was , after all, the period of what , Martin Marty calls "the r-txiern Schism: " "In the middle decades of the nineteenth century people who had acted in ooncert to !!'ake up Olristendcm finally divided into IlUtually opp:>silY:!' parties; one set devoted itself to religiOUS and ecclesiastical ooncerns. The other was increasingly pre-<:X£upied with the secular" (Marty: 9) "The years of the Schism, " says Marty, "spawned many rivals to Olristianity. " In America they made little progress; yet a natiCllalistic spirit had settled in by the Civil \~ar, and clergy, "both evangelical and catholic , were called upon to give clerical blessing to all the missions and p.lrflOSes of the nation, 00 the assumptioo that the manifest destiny had always been a part of the plan of God" (Marty: 134 ) . Of cwrse, not all religious Alrerica was satisfied with the simple natiooaliSlll, or with the eme with which evangelical Protestantism accepted the signs of the times and rlOVed toward consensual hartocny. 'nle early nineteenth century i n America was , in ooe sense, characterized by the fall ~t of the religiosi ty that was sp;llvned in the r~li9iolJS revolution of the sixteenth century. sydney ~lstron ca~ls. ~tten~ion to "America ' s religious fecundity" and to the religious 1.llchnduall.sm made manifest in Al.nerica" with the weakening of tradi~ion by Protestant/ Puritan principle and geographic distance (1 0 , 11). In the nu.dst of apparent consensus, many Americans of the early nineteenth century saw 0011' disarray. Anxiety and despair gave expression to a rrood in which there Clnerqed a number of resolutions designed to supply a new religious dynamic appropriate to the times, one that would maintain the consti tuti on essential to national life. First, there were the numerous at tempt s at repristination , the restoration of a presumably unsullied , p..!re, aM simpl e original O1ristianity. To these "Orristians," the centuries since the f ourth had produced a blighted Olristianity (Gaustad, 1973:315). Even the Re formation was suspect as they leaped across the tallast obstacles of history with a single tx:ound (Nevin 1849:499) . 'Ihen, of course, there was Shipps ' "new religious traditioo" --tJlc ~loIlioo.1ism that represents so radical a restoratioo that it must be considered an a lternative dispensation, a reconstroctioo of patriarchal Israel in a latter-day prClllised land. A third nv:x:1el of response to the religious disorder of the new nation was transcendentalism, a rcrnantic vision of the spirit to be found in the landscape and sinew of the new world, a domestication of the divine and an affirmation of the divinity of the ne\~ humanity in a land without a past. "The foregoing generations beheld Go::l and nature f ace to face," said Dlerson, "we through their eyes. Why should not we also enj oy an original relati on to the uni.verse?" 'lihat was at work was more than Transcendentalism with a capital T, it was a transceOOental "sutrnissioo to the materials of the American experience" (GI.lnn : 171) . According to thinkers like Jdln Williamson Nevin, the form of religiosity IOOSt COlIi O. to the new nation was what he called a Fal se or Pse!ldo Protestantism, itself part of the disarray of the timas. This, too, was an attempt to prO/ide a new religious dynamic. This foorth and rrost prevalent rrodel of res!Xl'lse to the cultural fatigue was the ()O'HeL'ful f orce of revivalistic evangelicaliSll that becarre a kiOO of American "Protestant" ideol ogy . Nevin f requently referred to this False Protest antism as Puritanism, with little critical attentioo to the justification of tho usage. Ho..Jever that !flay be , he had little trouble characterizing this False Protestantism as a religion of "Bible and Priva te Judgment" (Nevin 1849:495). nus was the reli gioo of the dalkJCCatic ll'iIinstream, a tradition I'lith its beginnings in New Fllgland Puritanism and its pronation of the evidences of saving faith (l·lorgan :42-47) . Various schefres of restoratioo, wrote Nevin, J1lI"POrt to provide a sirrple principle of unity for all true Orristians. That principle is "the unbound use solely of the Bible for the adjusorent of Orristian faith and practice" (1849 :492). In fact, continued Nevin, the principle is a divisive ooe, leading to sectarian prolife r ation. This is especi ally true when we realize that "No creed but the Bibl e" has a canple!llentary dictum--the idea of privat e judgment. 'the supposed suprerre author ity of the Bible is "conditioned always by the aSSlnption that every(one] i s authorized and round to get at this a uthority i n a dir ect way f or himself , through the medium simply of his single mind" (1 849 : 493) . Of course, no sect in existence act ually pennits the f ull demands of this dual maxim . Every ooe o f them has a scheJOO: that it claims becaoos self evident in every exercise of Bible and pri vate joogrrent (Nevin 1849 :495) . 'nle sectarian mind i s a utilitarian (niOO, claiming that maximal pri vate j\XJgment would reward the individual with the assurance of the salvatioo he sought . "0Jr national credo," writes Henry 1·lay , "has often teen described as a 33 canbination of simple moral lca.xims and easy utilitarianism" (113'1 : 53 ) . 'lhe ArTerican r eligiOUS mind I;:ecane daninated by this spiritual na;cissism or utilitarian salvaticnism, l.mat Nicolas Berdyaev (1 14) la .... er ~lled transcendental egois.ll . Of course, there were. U\OSC fo r ~ the pnva~e transformation they sought redirected thelr lives, tu.nung them ln disinterested J::enevolence to the servi ce of human ocmlTllmty ~ the voluntary societies of the tine. But ~ tren? was. tON~ .. self-lnceres~ religiosity. As Nevin stated in his dia trl.oo agal.nst Flnney s New l"easures: '!he higher f orce does not strictly and proj:erly take PJssession of the lawer rut is presUl1l3d to have been reduced to the [lOSsession ard service ~f this last, to be used by it for its own convenience. Religion does not get the sinner, rut it is the sinner who "gets religion." Justification is taken to be in fact by feciing, not by faith; and in this way falls back •. . into the sphere of self r ighteousness ... • (1844: 98-99) I t is understardable that this tradition should have been fashioned in our society. We were essentially a people who had been divested of their continuity with the past. Large numbers of people were thro<-m upon their own resources . Arrl, of course, "America, like nineteenth-century Europe, has had its theoreticians of dissent, rut in far greater abundance has it had its practitioners" (Gaustad 1973:6). 1·1e were a frontier people, a peopl e on the """" . '!his was a people "in roovement through space--a people exploring the obvious highways an:j the many unexplored and devious byways of practically unlimited g: Jgtaphical and social space. 'lhe quality of their minds and hearts and spirits was f orned in that great crucible- -and in a very short tine" Wead :7). So rruch space, so little titre; time only to gather whatever supplies and energies (material or spiritual) were essential to the trip. Faith and religiOUS resource had to be readily available to the individual in a ooee-for a ll, transforming experience. Fostered by revivalism and the style of the frontier, "the Bible and Private Judgment" became the creed of Alrerica. Taking sare of the theoretical tradition of Olristianity , the new religion fashioned i ts o,.m rrorality and ritual system. It found its social expression in the churches as voluntary associations of spiritually endowed individuals. 'llle error of such indiVidualism, according to Nevin, 11as that it was a false, a pseudo-Protestantism, coHpletely at ocld.s with the Reformation and the truth of its origins. It was a blind new construction, fashioned. rationalistically without regard for the r oots of the Oiristian revelation. This false I Protestantism, nurtured by the scherre of Bible and Private Judgment, drew the cx:",,;:lusioo that the Holy Spirit camtuni.cated with individuals, who might then voluntarily associate with each other and form churches. It assumed that the rressage of the Gospel was dir ected toward a cumulative conversi on of all the individuals in the world; that, theoretically, when/if that were accanplished, the IoIOrld would be at one and the claims of the Gosj:el fulfilled . This poi nt of view mistook for wholeness, wrote Jdm Nevin. '!he 11hole is always greater than its parts. Wholeness precedes the response of any Single individual or thereof. It is also more than the CUIllllative result of any ~ff0rt:s . Allness, or the collectivity o f individuals, is an illusion o f the mdivl.dual seeking the satisfaction of spiritual self_interest. Nevin maintains that it is the world that is reconcilErl--already r ecmciled- to God in Olrist. Any respa1Se to that reconciliation is a resp:::>nSe to the whole, which is already p:cesent, waiting to be re<:ogn.ized (Nevin 1851 :2-3, 17 , 201 . 34 He have isolated four rrodels of response to the religious fragmentation that was apparent to many in the first half of the nineteenth century: r estorationism, alternative (or radical) dispensational ism, transcernentalism and the dcmi.nant tradition of ''Bible and Private Judgment"~~what may ~ characterized as r evivalistic evangelicalism, what Nevin called False or Pselldo~Protestantism . other mcx:'Icls might te added to the list, such as Enlightenment r e ligion (t1ay : 149) or ~lead's r eligion of the Republic ( ~d : 65). 1hl.s l atter tradition shared many of the same utilitarian interests as the prevailing Protestant ideology. For this prevailing Protestant idoology represented a syncretistic mingling of the . . . religion of the denon1nations , which was COIIIOl.ly articulated in tenns of scholastic Protestant orthcdoxy and alm:>st universally practiced in tenns of tha experilrental religion of pietistic revivalism ... [and] the religion of the oorocratic society and nation. (Mead 1963: 135) What the "prevailing Protestant ideology" assll!led was the solution to our religious and cultural dilE!!fllla, John Nevin thought was a further symptan of deterioration. His own resolution of the dilenma rejects all four models of r eligiOUS reconstruction . To Nevin, America ' s spiritual predicatlEl1t was exemplified by its unhistorical and lll"ltheological biases . All four rrodels were laCking in theological and historical i ntegrity. As a matter of fact, theology and history go hand-in-hand ; and only a sound recognition of this truth could save America fran the ravages of spiritual narcissism. Restorationism (whether rrodest or radical, catopbellite or ~bL IlO') and transcendentalism were proo.ucts of the same frarre of mind that institutes revivalistic evangelicalism, with its dual axioms of the Bible and Private Judgment (Nevin 1849: 503). 1hl.s prevailing AIlerican religioo tended to view l\n'erica through the eyes of a New Horld nationalism . FrClll this perspective 1Isnerica was werely a trill!lI(X1ant ver sion of the natialalistic imp...l lse rarrpant in Europe, with the possible distinction derived fran the vision of America as a chosen, o:wenant nation. New Horld nationalism i s simply an extension of the same principle at work in utilitarian individualism; it is a nationalism which is the collectivization of individual expectations . The nation is the contractual and voluntary association of individuals "'ho "'ill work out their destiny by the maximizatioo of self-interest. It i s to be assumed that individual claims and expectatioos are the rreasure of all goodness; that the COtIIO) good, the national good, is magnification of the individual's pursuit of happiness . sacvan Bercovitch has argued that the "myth of 1Isnerica" energes out of the need to find sanctions for the hopes and dreams of the people. It was assuned by the emergent Americans that their need to be successful in the building of a "shining city on a hill" was sanctioned in holy scriptures and would be made fles h in a new breed of humans (Bercovitch:226). he may not agree with Bercovitch about the theory of myth iJnplicit in his argument. Certainly the model of hurtrulity shared by the Puritans was a much rrcre organic concept than the understanding which was to emerge by the nineteenth century when covenant becones a contractual affair. The Puritan CCtIDlUllity s till shared the mythic heritage o f centuries of catholic Olristendcm, in which a dialectical tension existed between the orders of c reati oo am the drama of individual selfhood (Nieb.lhr:pass1Inl . However, the agenda of Americans nurtured in the independent resourcefulness o f the frootier existence read; ly converted the myth to individualistic utility. 'llle levelling characteristics o f the new nation were exc:edingly utilitarian and democratic . '!he religious spirit generated in this new nation became very oontractual and oollective. 'll\e Bible became a manual for individual spiritual resources or an oracle to te consulted in relation to individual needs naturally oonsidered. Cbnsider the alternative claims upon the promise by the self-reliant individual and the self-proclain'ed nation of irrlividualism. In that oonflict lies a central cultural contradiction: the threat to society inherent in the very ideals of self- interest through which society justifies itself • .. 'll\e rhetoric implies that America's future, and by extensioo the fate of humanity, hinges on the efforts of the individual representative Arrerican. (8ercovitch:226) New World Nationalism was in effect utilitarian individualism writ large. It was a spirituality which supported the needs of a people on the rrove, a nation 00 the make . fobbility, perfectibility, i.nmediacy, irrlependent resourcefulness , and collpetition were the agenda of the tirres. Robert Bellah defines utilitarian individualism as "the maximization of self-interest" with minimal restraints (' 980:1 70) . "Americans have tended to see their fredon arxl. fulfillment," writes Ralph Ketcham, "as ptopJrtionate to their lack of public burden and intrusion" (Ketcham:viii) . Bellah maintains that "utilitarian individualism was never wIxIlly ccmpatible with the biblical tradition" (Bellah 1980:169). Perhaps not colipatible with sane essential or normative interpretation of biblical tradition; yet revivalistic evangelicali9ll assisted in the transformation of the Bible into a utilitarian resource for individual spiritual exp&:tations. '!he revivalistic evangelical tradition is very IIl.ICh in harmaly with utilitarian individualism. It terrls toward the maximization of individual spiritual self- interest. '!he church beco.es a oollectivity of individual spiritual self-interest. And inasrmlch as the c hurch i s reduced to utilitarian significance, individuals may project their individual expectatioos onto a natlcnal collectivity as well. Both church and state have no real covenant or organic reality; they do not represent anything nore than oollective self-interest, individually oonsidered. Both are mechanical, collective realities. -nus critique of Arrerican nationalism lies at the heart of John Nevin ' s UJ'rlerstanding of "Catholicism" and his reflections on major public events in the middle of the nineteenth century. Nevin was the theolOCJian of the Mercersburg rrovement, a nineteenth-century developnent in American religious thought that asserted. itself against the mainstream of American Protestantism, particlllarly in its revivalistic evangelical forms. He rejected the Anericanizatioo of Olristianity and affiLliCd the reoovery of the fullness of the Catholic substance. Although historians like James Hastings Nichols have characteri zed the /1:lroersburg theology as the i\merican counterpart of the "traditionalist, ' churchly, ' sacrancntal" rcmanticism sweeping across Europe "in the second generation of the nineteenth century" (Nichols:3), they fail t o Lecx:Jgll.ize that John Nevin had actually J1WJe a revolutiotlaLy discovery . Nevin was not rrerely a spokesperson for the romantic counterbalance to the ratiooalism that had overtaken the Western world in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. lis Nichol s himself acknowled;Jes by giving title to a chapter 00 "Nevin 's ' Dizziness ' " (Nichols:192_217) , Nevin had. disoovered that the Arrerican fascinatioo with individual salvation was a departure fran the catholic character of the Gospel. The discovery was tra\mlatic especially as the s ignificance of i t descerrled ever !TOre deeply into his thinki ng. I t was 36 . not a discovery that was tenable among the ranks of American Protestants who were nurtured on anti-catholicism, perfectionism, and utilitarian individualism. Fran the beginning of his days at ~iarshall College and the (£:rman Reforrred ~~ ~ Mercers~~g, Nevin knew that his "Catholicism" was contrary to reVl.vallstlc evangellclsm and that it affected his understaOOing of Arrerican nationalism. "Catholicism" challenged the collective individualism of American religion and culture. It was not in harmony with the maximization of self interest. For, as we have already seen, Nevin distinguished between all and whole as two interpretations of the universality implicit in the tenn "catholic." All, wrote Nevin, is an abstraction ; it is rrerely a collective projection of individuals, "derived fran the contemplation or thought of a certain number of separat e individual existences, which are brought together in the mind and classified collectively by the notion of their ccnm::m properties" (Nevin 1851:2). This kirrl of generality is limited because it "can never transcend the true t:ourrls of the empirical process o..\t of which it grows" (Nevin, 1857:3). It is a totality existing only in the mind and strictly dependent U{XlO units irrlividually considered. When all is the urrlerstanding of "catholiC, " salvation beca,es a gathering, an asso::ia tion, a oollective representation of totality. According to this view, the work of the gospel is ••• scmething canparatively outward to the proper life of man , and so a power exerted en it nechanically frem abroad for its salvation, rather than redemption brought to pass in it fran the il1!OClSt depths of its own nature . According to this view, the great purpose of gospel is to save rren fran hell, and bring them to heaven; this is accaoplished by the machinery of the atonement and justification by f aith, carrying along with it a sort of magical supernatural change of state and character by the ~ of the Holy Spirit, in conformity with the use of certain means for the purp:>se on the part of rren ; and so now it is taken to be the great work of the O1urch to carry forward the process of deliverance, alnnst exclusively under such rrechanical aspect, by urging and helping as many souls as possible in their separate individual character to flee from the wrath to cane and to secure for thauselves through the grace of conversion a goc:xl. hope against the day of judgrrent (Nevin 1851 : 7) . No redemptioo can be real for humankind individually taken, inasmuch as naked individuality is itself an abstraction . The view of the all is faced with the f act that many individuals born and \.U1OOrn may never enoounter Olrist or ackrlt:7.lledge their own nature as caopleted in Him. Yet, according to Nevin, this f act in no way negates the catholic character of the O1urch. catholicity is not dependent u{XlO the flI..llIerical extent explicit in alL 'the true meaning of catholic is expressed in the word "whole." Catholicity s i gnifies a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts, an organic Wlity that radically rejects all partial claims and embraces individuality into itself. "The whole man ... is not simply all the elerrents and rx::Ners that enter empirically into his ccnstitutioo, rut this living OJI1Stitution itself r ather as SCIlething more general than all such elerrents and ~ , if! virtue of whicn CXlly they COo rle to be thus what they are in f act" (Nevin 1851 :3). Therefor e , 37 Christian salvation is catholic to the extent that it ~ve.rs all constituent interests of human existence. Christianity is cathol1c ~n the sense that Christ is our original nature, the fulf~l~t of all our t;h<>ughts , ~ctions , and aspirations. The Catholic Church afhnns that the last.~dea .of this world as brought to its conpletion in man is made perfectly poss~ble ~n the form of Christianity ••• anc1 that this p:.YWeI" can never cease to work until it shall have actually taken possession of the world as a whole, and shall thus stand openly and clearly revealed as the true consUlll'ation of its nature and history in every other vie-w" (Nevin 1851 : 5) . Catholicity rooasures "the entire length and breadth of man's nature. " 'Il\ere is no constituent interest that is extrinsic to the catholicity represented by Christianity. Nevin ' s thought challenges not ooly the voluntaristic, cmtractual, and oollectivist notion of the church rut the very ~tanding of salvation itself. Nevin's i s a venture in Heilsgeschicthe, making salvation a rrediating and dynamic process, (to use one of Nevin ' s favorite metaphors) a constitution of grace that takes the orders of the world into itself. There can be no salvation for the individual which is not a t the same time real for humanity in one of many sp"eres of 1000ral existence. salvation is never mine , it is ours as the constitution of grace fulfills the partial aspirations of each, always in relation to a greater whole than is envisia ed or 'Ihl.s is the p:lint at which Nevin ' s understarrling of catholicity may be addressed to the role of America in Heilsgeschichte. '!he state is not to be considered. a "factitious or accidental institutioo ••• continued for the use of man's l ife fran abr oad and brought near to it ally in an outward manner" (Nevin 1851 : 10) . 'ltva; state belongs inherently to life. It is an organic expression of the nor al nature, part of the activity of rea500 and will that is fundamental to existence. All states derive their pa.:er and significance from this fact. In the m:::dern wor ld, states tend to convert their roles as agencies in the moral order int o extensions of pride and self-interest individually rut oollectively extended. This is nationalism, to which the American Repililic must not fall victim. There are two essays by Nevin, written approximately sixteen years apart, that de Icustrate this dimensioo of his thinking . Each is a resp:nse to a crisis which Nevin credits with "world-historical" significance. The first directs the reader's attention to the revolutionary events of 1848 in EUrope and their relatioo to the role of America. The seCClld is a discussioo of the significance of the Ci vil \~ar, written at the end of that American oonflict. In his examination of "The Year 1848," Nevin invests it with a significance like no other year since the Refonnaticn. It is an annus mirabilis, a t.i.lte in which the minority of the American RepJblic came to an end (Nevin 1849:21). As EllrO{:e an mirds sought to understand the critical events of 1848, they tUliL:!d with increase'" attention towards the new world across the Atlantic. 'lhe unse t tling o~ Europe took place just after three or four years of Amarican self-examinatioo relat ed to TeXas , Oregon, and ~co . D..lring those years the "vortex of exci tement and agitation into which (Ame r ica) was so suddenly drawn" se 2med to portend a revolutioo that WUlld overturn the new Repililic and end in a catast.rqhe to match the conflagraticns of 1846 in Ellrope (Nevin 1849 : 22). Instead, says Nevin, ''Texas has taken her place quietly • •• '!he Oregon boundarY has l:: --n peacefully settled. The t-'ex.i.can War has been conducted through a seri es of brilli ant victories" and we have settled in "en the sarre political ground we occupied bef ore" (Nevin 1849 : 22) . " . NcM , of course, Nevin was writing just at the lTo(ent of all this critical circunstance. His view of history was myopic and he may have been s~t alcng by the spirit of his times . However, he did understand the difference between attorean revoluti ons and American upheavals . American sucx::-s represented oot the victory of a nation but the dawn of an ep:xh. It had to do with "the world-historical ep::x:::h [which may be compared) .• • with the mystic c1000 at the Red sea, which was all darkness, we are told, on one Side, and on the other full of light" (Nevin 1849: 23) . To Nevi n the institutions of the 1IIrerican experiment have demonstrated their "moral sublimity" that vindicated the role of the Rep.1blic in the struggle to set the world on its way to an appropriate r esp:nse to the coaxing of Provi dence (Nevin 1849: 241 . In Europe the breaking up of old institutions took place "as though this order of life had finished its course" at the same tirre that an "asylWll" and "theatre" were to be found for the proper "metempsychosis in the flow of universal history" (Nevin 1849 : 26). ''We are not so foolish, " wrote Nevin, "as to conceive of this under the form of a s imple triunph of our national spirit, as it now stards, aver the social arv::'I political institutions of the old world . . . " (Nevin 1849: 28-291 . He rejected such ootions as Manichaean and had no synpathy with the r evolutionary actions in Europe as evidence of Providential activity. Those revolutions were "fran l:::eneath rather than fran above." '!here is no reason to asswre that the ultimate r esult of the process will be "the American state of scciet y, as it now steOOs, substituted by universal exchange for every other p::>litical order" (Nevin 1849 : 30 ) . curs is not the perfect rodel of church and state. Here we are merely the theatre in which the revolutionary spirit of Europe may view its own developing life. However, EUrope is not a grand failure, its monarchies not inferior nr:des of evil qoyernance . 'I\1ere is no justification for a narrow American natiCl'"lalism. 'lhat would be to assune that the substance of our life is fixed and under our own control as an irdividual natiC(l especially "saved" and sharing its narrative of salvation with other nations individually considered. Instead, Europe still has a r ol e to play in what is happaning to the world.. For it i s "the worl d itself ••• wrestling in its own inrrost exnstitution, through the rredium of American influence, towards a general and CCXl1'I'IOO end, which may be said to enhance the sense of its history for centuries past" (Nevin 1849 : 30) . Providence works toward wholeness, not allness. Neither Allerica nor any other nation individually considered is saved; rrerely exist in the will be what they will be Any greatness for in that fact. We are not a said Nevin, tempted to make of ourselves the neasure of the whole world. may mean , in Nevin's thalght, a rejection of the "city up:>n a hill" in favor of a "theatre for the world. " The rew historical period is not to "prcc::d fran the life of this country, just as it fl()IW stands, in an altward JreChanica1 way . " We are the theatre for the working out of "a properly W'Liversal spirit." '111e wholeness which the world seeks and the catholicity Olristianity represents can counterbalance no "abstract Americanism. " It is not a matter of gathering the p&::Iples of the world together i n a voluntary association of iOOividuals. That i s an abstract which can never be achieved. What is at stake is a gathering up of the . "what is of worth in the mind and heart of all lands, " place i s "an inward reproduction of their true sense under a new organic and universal form" (Nevin 1849 :33). Nevin' s urderstarrling o f Providence and the working of catholicity provide a CQ\'()rettensiC(l of the nature of the Rep.1blic that is quite different from the emergent natiCl'"lalism of his times . 39 His rejection of the salvati onal self- inte r e st present in ,revi,valistic evangelicalism is of a piece with his demal o f ~ tract lImer1.c At the close of the Civil War, Nevin lectured on "The Nation ' s Second Birth. " 'Ihere are nations, he said, which are representative natims, like representative persons. They "take up into themselves and sha,.,l forth at a given tirre, beyald others, the central stream of history, regarded as being for the ....arId at large .. . " (Nevin 1865) . The Civil War , for example, was resolved in a way that defied pas t experience; the opinion abroad was of our "total and perpetual eclipse." The crisis was too great, to:) profound, to 00 handled by any plan of hunan wisdan. Abraham Lincoln, Nevin reminde::3 his auditors at Franklin and Marshall O::lllege, was an astute servant of Providence, who had "a sense of uncertain dependence on the ~urse of events. " He CCilI,llitted himself to the circumstances without regard to personal i mportance . In order that Arrerica ' s deliverance oould assune its world-historical role , what God had wrought had to be_we what humankind elected and sought to unde rstand (Nevin 1865). '!he War was "the nation's second birth. " Like the year 1848 , the end of the Rep.lblic ' s minority, it was world-histor ical. Perhaps the \~ar occurred because the Republic had failed to take into its "inward constitution" what Providence had teen pointing to in the Grand crisis of 1848. "In Ctrist," wrote Nevin in a respc.ru;e to Orestes Brownson , rrost literally and truly, the supernat ural order came to a living and perpetual marriage with the order of nature; which i t could not have dale, if the constitution of the one had not been of like sort with that of the ot;her, made in the image truly of 00 SOlitary portent, in the ·;';dst of (Nevin 1850: '!be cnly real alternative to Arrerica's historyless sectari anism was a high doctrine of the O\urch, which manifests the wholeness for which the world is searching. Nevin's catholicity was radical because it ref used to be satisfied with any penultimate or het:eroncm::.us claims Upal the wholeness that bears within. itself tl\e capacity and power to Erobrace the whol e world. 'Ihe Iioly Catho~l.C Olurch is quite visible in its sacramental reality, but it is an orgaru.c whole greater than the Sl.Ull of its parts. To sectarianism of any Idnd it says: You are claiming f or yourself what can only belong to the whole . '!he Olurch has the power to lift the natural life of hunanity to a level beycod ordinary kr¥::lwledge , beyond nature (Nevin 1851 : 23-26) . Nevin ' s views of tl\e Christ and of the Olurch ran oontrary to the mains tream of American r eligion. Nevertheless, they sought to be a oontriootioo to the spiritual dilerrma of the Arrerican epoch . Prevalent forms of Arrerican religion were not equal t o the ooward rrovement of the wor ld I nstead they were s ymptanatic of its disruptive underside. • 40 Ahlstrcm, Sydney E. "FtOIl Sinai to the G:>lden Gate" in Jacob NeedlefMl1, 1978 George Baker, eds., Understanding the New Religions . New York: 'Ihe Seabury Press . Bellah, Robert The Broken Covenant. New York: ~ SeabJry Press. 1975 1980 Varieties of Civil Religion. New York: Harper & Row . Dercovitch, sacvan In 221 ~229 . 1983 Ed. Berdyaev, Nicolas The Ilest i ny of Nan. lDndon: Geoffrey Bles . 1937 Binkley, Luther J. The ~1ercersb.rrg Theology. Lancaster: Franklin and 1953 i-rushall College. Brownson , orestes Brownson ' s Q,lartedy Review, IV. 1847 G3.us tad, F,di..t in S . Dissent in American Religion. Chicago: University of 1973 Olicago Press. 1982 A Dc::cumenta;y History of Religion in America to the Civil War. Grand Rapids : I-hn . B. Eerdmans . Qmn, Giles New \':odd ~taphysics . New York: Oxford University Press. 1981 Hudsal, Winthrop Nationalism and Religion in America. /lEw York : Har(;er s. & ReM . 1970 Ketcham , Ralph I ndividualism and Public Life. New York : Basil Bl ackwell. 1987 Marty , Martin E. The Mcdern SChism . New York: Harper & Row. 1969 May, Henry F. 1983 Mead , Sidney E. 1963 Merk, Frederick Manifest Destiny and Mission i n American History. New 1966 York: Vintage Books. "brgan , E'Omwxl Visible saints . Ithaca and London: COmell University 1963 P 41 Nevin, J ohn \~illiamson 1844 The Pickwick Press, 1978. 1849 "'Ihe Year 1848," and "'!he sect System." In The . Vol. 1:10- 44 , 482-507. 521-539. 1850 Review. " In The Mercersburg 1851 " and "'!he Anglican Crisis." In The Mercersburg Review, vol . 111 : 1-26, 359-398. 1865 "The Nation's second Birth. " In German Reformed Messenger, XXX, 49, July 26 , 1. Nichols , Jarres Olicago: University Hastings 1961 NiebJhr, Reinhold New York: Charles 1955 Shipps , Jan MoI'fOClf1ism. Urbana and O'Licago: University of Illinois 1985 Press. Acknowledgement: This article has been reprinted by permission f ran the Journal of the Arrerican Acad2Lny of Religion. 42 OOI'ES rn NE.VIN ' FAMILY II John R. I'ieiler Retired United Q1urch of Quist Pastor Bethlehem, Pennsylvania Uhen the l-'ercersburg Society n~ts at PBthlehem, PA in June 1995 part of the pro:;ram will be presented at tJ1e cathedral Q1urch of the Nativity. 'Ihe Cathedral should be of salle interest to SOCiety r!embers because one of its rectors was Robert J. Nevin, a son of John II. Nevin. In a¥tion, John w. Nevin's daughter 11artha, about whan I have written previously, was ,narried to Robert H. Sayre, a founder and benefactor of the Cathedral. Martha ' 5 sons, John \~ . Nevin ' s only grandchildren, were born and raised in the Sayre mansion \mich is situated diagonally across the street fran the cathedral. A bronze tablet, erected by the grandsons, hangs on the wall of the cathedral's Sayre O'Ia,->el . It rne!IDrializes their [lUther 1-1artha and rrentions that she was the sister of Robert J. Nevin, Nativity's second rector . vlhen the SOCiety gathers for lunch in the dining roCJTI of the cathedral '5 Sayre Hall, a framed photcqraph of young Robert J. Nevin, koking rather solemn and wearing a pair of pince-nez sr-ectacles, will be close at hand. It hangs there in company wi th the pictures of other Cathedral worthie.<; CJl the dining roan wall . Fran the dining room window the large stone rectory which the bachelor Nevin occupied during his brief tenure at Nati vi ty in 1869 is visible. 'Ihe evidence I have been able to uncover suggests that Rebert J . Nevin was rather ~ll kro.m in his day. He had an interesting and distinguished career which is worth recalling. Born 011 November 24, 1839 in Allegheny City, PA, which is noo.~ a part of the Northside of Pittsburgh, he was the third child of John \'1. Nevin, then a professor at the l/estern 'J.heological Seminary of the Presbyterian O1urch, and his I,He t/artha Jenkins Nevin. He was named for his maternal grandfather, Robert Jenkins, a prcxninent iron ,l\aster, of OlUrchtown, Caernarvon'ro...nship, Lancaster O:lunty, PA. Robert was only an infant I,hen his father accepted a call to becane Professor of 'Iheology at the Seminary of the German Re f onred O1urch in 1'1ercersbul"g. In the spring of 1840 the Nevins rroved to the lit tle central Pennsylvania town which was to b.:!ccme ....-ell knCMl1, during the next decade , as the birthplace of the !-Ercersburg pDverrent. '!he family occupied one of the "=ttages" proVided for professors. Robert had tHO older siblings, \~illiam mlheriorce and Alice Nevin. 'Ihey would be joined in the next few years by an additional three brothers and two sisters. m1:.hoJ.t doubt Robert ' s rrother, Hattha Jenkins Nevin, was a key figure in the household. She is described by Dr . Jolm C. flo\.~ Tlan as a : ''wo:na.n of great r:ersonal refinerrent, of cheerful and vivacious disp:>SitiCJl, well versed in literature and ~ll fitted, i n ,,2very way to meet the social and inte llectual demands of her stat10n. 11artha Nevin rro:3eled her haoe after the one to which she had been accustcmed at \~ind.sor Forge, her parents ' l1'aIlSion in O1urchtc;o;m. Windsor Forge was a center of learning and culture W1dergirded by a deep piety. It is safe to assume that Robert and his siblings grew up in a similar atonosphere at "Ercersburg. 'm children were educated in the local schools . Their father gives us a brie f gl~e of family life in a letter to his o,.m. \nother: ''Willie Alice am Bob go to school this sumner to Hr .. B~dley . Blanche' and o:cil are 00 a visit just OCM to t1r!; . j ·1ar~s w t he country; am as they seem to enjoy.themSelv~s there and ~Ir . and !>Ir::> . Maris are anxious to keep them, har-ng no ehl.ldren of theu own , they may continue there f o r S Without doubt the Nevin children experienced a happy and cootented childhood. However as often hawened in those days , death reached into the Nevin hone and snatched a young victim. Q1 December 29, 1848 John \·1. Nevin wrote a touching letter to George Besore, an elder in the RefoLned Olurch of nearby ~Iaynesboro, 00 the death of his young son. Nevin cx:>r""Cludes that: "I write just now as one well prepared to ' weep with them that weep' for the corpse of my o.m. yoongest child is sleeping in its little coffin close at hand, am I expect to follow it in a few hours this stormy day to its last r esting place in our Cblleqe CEmetery. I·Je have had six cases of measles arrong us l atterly, all of which have enirj favor ably with the exception of the last, that of our sweet habe, now nearly arrived at the end of his first year, whose fine vigorous constitution seemed more likely to bring him safely through than that of any of our children besides. But he was at the sarre tine in the severe process of teething; and the ecxnbined disorders proved too strong for his terrler strength. He became a ffected i n his brain and finally has breathed out his soul into his ~1aker's hands; last cOle .:;onrl first gone of the little circle of 10lle to which he belooged. "q- RoIert would have I:::n nine at the tine of this loss and no doubt recalled i t during the rest of his life. A few years later the Nevin children were uprooted frem their childhood hooE . In 1853 Marshall College, a preparatory school closely connected with the Seminary, was moved to Lancaster and marged with Franklin college. John VI. Nevin had t: en president of Marshall College since 1841 and \~as a sked to be president of the new <:X)TIbined institution. 'waried by years of errotional, phYSical, and financial strain associated with the ~ercersburg institutions and the Mercers\:Qrg controversies he declined arv::'I rnovErl his family to carlisle instead. In 1855, at the urging of his wife , the Nevins moved to LancaSter to be eleser to the intellectual atmos~re which J ohn \·1 . Nevin so much enjoyed. F:r::au there the next I!VVe was to Windsor Forge where he spent two years settling the estate of hiS> JOO~-in- law. In 1,858-59 the Nevins built a ne~ ho~ , Caernarvon Place, a grac~ous gentlerren s estate, along the Col umbia Pl.ke, ~n Lancaster. '!here they moved and remained the rest o f their lives. It is difficult to kna,~ hCM Rcb:>rt Nevin fared during all these rnoves, but in 1856 he entered Franklin and Marshall College from which he graduated with highest honors in 1859. He delivered the Marshall Oration on "Olief Justice Marshall. " In 1868 he was elected president of the Franklin and ~larshal1 Alurrni Associatioo After graduatioo he went to New Yor k City where he taught Greek in the classi cal Olurch Schcx>l associated with the RevereM George Houghtoo, rector of 44 . the Episcopal Q'lUrch of the iransfiguration fX>p.l1ar1y Mown a fter 1870 as "The Little O1urch around the COrner." In 1861 Robert returned to Lancaster to becuie a tutor in Greek at Franklin and 1·\arshall . :::t was not long before this quie t acadanic existence was inter rupted by the Civil \~ar. a-t August 11, 1862 Robert entered military service to be follO'Hed just eleven days later by his older brother Hilliam Hilburforce Nevin. Reber t becarre a second Lieutenant of O::lfi\pany C, 12200 Regiment, Pennsylvania Volunteers . He was prOlroted to first Lieutenant and served until the Ccmpany was mustered out on 113y 15 , 1863. Shortly afterward he re-entered service and organized I nde(:endent Battery I , Pennsylvani.:l ,\rtillery which became knO'w'll as Nevin's Battery. He continued in servi ce until mustered out again with his Battery 00 June 23, 1865 . He ended his military career with the rank of Brevet Ma jor, ccmnanding the ~ntral Brigade in front of the defenses of ,~ashington, D.C. '!he anxiety felt by the Nevins over the future of their pronu.s~ng soldier son i s reflected in a letter written by John H. Nevin to his daughter Blanche in Philadelphia and dated June 28, 1863: "Robert has his battery CCX'nplet ed and is ordered to Harrisburg totOrrow . .. \'.'e are in the hands of God. He can make all things ....,ork for good in the end. I am, of course , greatly concerned for Robert but he is in the way of duty .. . She (l-Iartha Nevin) bears the exciting occasion now on us with pro(:er calmness." EXactly where Robert served I-.'Quld require further research. Since the above letter was written a short time before the Battle of Gettysburg it is p::>Ssible he saw action ther e . Returning fran military service, Robert entered the Philadelphia Divinity School of the Episcopal O1urch but later transferred to General Seminary in New 'fork City. His choice of Seminary i~cates that he had bocone an Episcopalian but just when is hard to determine. There is evidence that another of J ohn \'1. Nevin ' s sons, Richard Cecil, had also entered the Epi scopal O1urch . He graduated fron Franklin and 113rshall in 1863 and was a student at General Seminary at the time of his death on ,"larch 22, 1867. He was 24 years of age . In any case, these conversions to Anglicanism resulted in criticism of John w. Nevin and were presented as evidence of ....'here esjXlUSal of the ~'iercersburg Theology would eventually load. Robert was ordained a deacon in the f.l;Iiscopal Olurch at ~1est Olester, PA in 1867, but SOCXl afterward sailed for Rare in order to regain his health. We do not krw:lw what his physical problems were. Perhaps his war service was a factor in the situation. \~ith his historical and cultural interests it rra.y also be that he was simply drawn to the Eternal City as many well-to-do ArTe ricans were at that tirre and ever since. He remained in Rcrne for six months during which perioo he became acquainted with a group of wealthy i'lrrerican Episcopalians rurong ...man was the banker J. P. 1-lorgan. In 1868 he returlled to Asrerica and accepted a positicn as assistant to th; Reverend Eliphelet Nett Potter, rector of Nativity Olurch in South Be thlehem. I n addition to his church duties Potter held a position at the newly founded Lehigh University with the imp::>Sing title of "Professor of /-bral and ~~ntal Philosophy and Olristian EVidences" and was University secretary. 'Ihough by today ' s standards these positions involved small institutions, indeed Potter found himself very busy . He r e signed fran Nativit y a f ew rronths after Robert Nevin officiated at his first service there on June 14, 1868. Nevin was elevated to the priesthood on June 24, 1869 at Nativity, B~shop William Bacon Stevens ordained and Henry Orlnan POtter , who ~te r beca uE Bishop o f New York, preached.. There was an afternoon service at wtuch Dr . ~lombert, o f Lancaster, preached. 01 ~lar ch 1st Nevin took over the pastoral charge f rom Potter at a salary of $1600 . The new rector ev i dently f ound favor with Robert H. Sayre, Nativity's chief founder, ~d Nevin~s,f~ture .brOther-in-~aw . Sayre ' s diary contains numerous references to l-tr. Nev~n s taldng"tea or dimng at the Sayre mansion. An entry for June 13, 1869 notes : heard an .excellent discourse fran Mr. Nevin on ' '!bere is joy in heaven over one s~nner who repents . , to en April 25, 1869 a Sunday SChool was opened under Nevin ' s auspices in North Bethlehem. This work eventually developed i nto the pr esent Trinity Episoopal Clurch. The beginning of a pronising ministry carre to an early em, for on August 16 , 1869 Nevin resigtCd citing ill health as hi s r eason. He planned to return to Role and sailed for Ellrope in o::tober. '!be vestry hoped that he wou l d return to Bethlehem and left the rectorship open, but in a letter dated February 8, 1870 Nevin wrote f r an Rane th~t he would not be OOi~ng bac~ . . 1·Ihi Se his health was better he still needed e nt~re rest according to his phys~c~an . Again one can only speculate at:out Nevin ' s health. It was not unccmnon for physicians in the Victor i an e ra, puzzled by their patient s' physical and errotional sympt.cms, to reCOllllE nd travel or " <1 change of scenery." After Nevin settled In 1869 Rune was in an unsettled conditi on. The fi r st Vatican COuncil called by Pc:lI:e Pius IX, attempted to meet under diff i cult political circumstances . A small ban::J. of Italian patri ots was det ermi ned to oust the Pope f r an his position as temporal head of the city and make Rcme the capital of a united Italy. In spite of the situation J . P. I·brgan secured permission to buy l and for an Alrerican church to be built within the walls of the old c i ty. Property was purchased near the ruins of the Baths of Diocl etian and pl ans made for the erection of a buildi ng. J . P. Morgan was a pri ncipal donor as was Hrs. Hilliam Backhouse Astor, THE NRS . 1\5'100. Rotert Nevin was asked to take charge of the proj ect. COnstruction of the church ~ in 1879 . 1-1hen it was finished six years later the congregation, called St. Paul's IH thin the \'la11s, {X'Ssessed a large, in\X>Sing Neo-Rcmanesque structure. It was the first non Ronan Catholic church to be built wi thin the old city. t10saics designed for tho apse by Sir Edward Burne....Jones, the f amous Pre-Raphaelite artist, were an outstanding feature . To this day St. Paul's r emains an active congregation on the Via Nazionale. l'ihen I worshiped there i n 1979 I discovered in the chancel a memorial plaque to Rotert Nevin. He is shown in a bas relief looking benign and possessing a very full heard. According to canon Clarles Shreve who was rector o f St. Paul 's fran 1954 to 1957 Nevin b.ti.lt a large rectory next to the church and paid for it himself. He had 11 servants, a black coachman, and ente rtained everybody of imp:lrtance. Shreve believes that the r ectory becarre, in effect, an art gallery. Nevin 46 searched through Italy f or suitable objects to ruy . He found an ab..' ndoned church in Gubbio with 14th century frescces \~hich he !:ought and later sold to the I"etropolitan Museum. \·/hen the Torlonia Palace was tom down he purchased a marble fireplace and doorway done by the Danish sculptor, 'Ihorwaldsen, which is sti 11 in the rectory. To be fair one must add also that the rectory was known as a refuge for any Arrerican who was i n distress in RClile . It is dif ficult to assess the accuracy of all this information tcx:1ay . ~lhat seems certain is that Nevin was active in ~rs~ing his artistic i nterests i n a city which was fcl/TOUS for its art and artists. I n 1878 in a volume entitled "St . Paul ' s Within the Walls" Nevin gave a deta iled account of the history of his church and its work to that date. 'n"Ie building of St. Paul ' s was not without its dangers . Pope Pius IX was to lose his tempora l p::!Wer in September 1870 and retreat within the walls of the Vatican. It was oot imJX)Ssible for Nevin to be the object of attack by catholic fanatics who believed that the existence of a nc:n-Catholic church i n Holy RClle was an aff ront to the Pope. Back horre Nevin and his father were subject to a verbal attack. In an unsigned sarcastic article in the Re fOIUed Q"lUr ch Messenger for July 21, 1869 a writer says : "that rrroem prophets have said that Dr . Nevin and many others following his lead wwld finally head up at Rone . 'Ihis prophetical warning i s nearl y fulfilled not strictly by the Doctor himself but by a j unior rrernber of hi s family . Robert J . Nevin, soo of our slow Raneward leader, has outrun his father. I t is now said he is going aver 00dy and soul to Rone . He has been appointed to take charge of tie 1Ime.rican Olapel in the "Eternal City. " He will no doubt reach there in tirre for the ~'s General COUncil; not, however as a ITef1i)er of it; f or in his church he is not a bishop, though his fathEr is in curs. But there may be several such asseriblages before cur honored D:xtor makes his sutmissien to the Holy Father. Before that happens these prophets may all be dead. And even for their ccrnfort we cannot agree to hasten the fulfil1.nent of their wishes . For the last twenty years our movcnent has been slow in that direction. 'So we went tcrwards Rane . ' Acts 28:14 is the scriptural and harmless wa"j of going there . " Of course, neither John \~. ~vin nor Robert ever made their sul:mission to the Holy Father. Not all prophesies are fulfilled . Rd">ert Nevin ' s {X)Sitioo in Rolle just at the time of the first Vatican COUncil gave him a unique opp:>rtunity in the field of church unity. He interested hi.noself in the Old catholic l·bVa'1el1 t which had arisen in opposi tien to the absolutist claims of the Popa and attended as a representative of the Scottish and Alrerican Episcopal Olurches conferences of the Old catholics in Cbnstance i n 1873 and in Bonn in 1874 . Robert published pamphlets 00 the Old catholic Olurch and a vol ume "Reunion CCOference i n Bonn" in 1875. In 1884 he delivered a course of six lectures at ,\ndover seminary on "TIle Claims of Rcme" which were favorably received . In his OWTI denanination he was president of the Standing COTmi t tee of the ArrErican Episcopal Olurches in Eur()!:e and was a deleqate to the ~is~l General Convention on many cx;casioos. According to one source he asslst~ his old friend, Bishop Henry Cadman Potter, with the first plans f~ the building of the cathedral of St. John the Di vine . As early as 1874 NevlO began to be more widely recognized when Unioo College, his father's Alma Mater, gave him a 47 . Doctor of Divinity degree. Hobart college conferred upJn him a Dcx:tor of Laws deJlee in 1887 . R<">b?rt Nevin's !X>Sition in Rare ~allle Wlique as the 'years passe~ . He was ooe o f the best kr\c:7.Jn Alrericans in Europe . He is descnbed as hanng a strong personality, great leadership skills, and a genial social disposition . He was one o f the very few Alrericans who belonged t o the Athenaeum Club o f London . He also held mambership in the Century Club and the Art Club of New York City. His large circle of friends i ncluded churchmen, statesman, and men ? f letters fran all parts of the world. Kaiser Wilhelm II, Paul Krueger, Cec~ l ru:mes , W. E. Gladstone, President Diaz of ~1exico and Theodore Roosevelt knew hun. An unideltified author of a shor t biography o f Nevin says of him that: "As he gave himself without reserve to the severe activities o f life so he enjoyed the hardships o f a severe recreation." The reference is to the fac t that Nevin was an enthusiastic SfX>rtsman who hunted big game on every oontinent and in the company of Theodore Roosevelt in the American Ro:kies. In the course of his travels he is said to have crossed the ocean ninety tirres . lie was always proud of his military service in the Civil \·Iar. In a letter f raTI Rare in May 1899 he wrote "I have built up a plant here worth half a willion dollars but someha,.; I feel as if that for which I deserved nust credit was my service fran 1862-65 along the Potcxnac." Because of his deep feelings aOOut his experience in the Civil War it is not surprising that he was eventually buried in Arlingtcn National Cemetery. While 00 a visit to Clticago in 1906 Nevin broke severa l ribs in an accident. 'I'tn.lgh they did not knit properly he !lOVed en to the wilds of G-Je rro, t·ExlCO , for a hunting expedition. Following his return to his hotel in t-1exico City he died of heart failure on September 20. His body was returned to Lancaster 011 Septeuber 29th where services were held in St. James Episcopal Church in charge of Bishop Darlington. As he never married, the chi e f mourners at his funeral were his surviving sisters and b.u ne~ews. '!hat afterTXXXl he was taken to Washington for burial in Arlington Celretery. The scene at Arlington was an int>ressive one. His casket was oorne on a gun carriage by a detachment of soldiers and c l ergy. Bishop Henry 'fates Satterlee, another great builder, officiated. 1\ last volley rang out in the stillness near the spot where Nevin himself had been stationed during the Civil War . Washington Potts, an old bugler, SOW1ded taps for his fanner c arroaooing officer as he had done so often more than forty years before. Nevin wrote his o.m epita~ for his tombstene . It was to read "Soldier for the Union and freetm in the U. S .A. 1862-1865. Builder of s t. PaUl ' s Olurch, Rcroe, Italy 1869 ." Since only military servi ce may be mentioned on a stene at Arlington enly the firs t phrase was allowed. FLail the evidence now available it seems certain that Rd.:Iert Nevin led an interesting and productive life. His tastes were far- reaching and COSIlqX>li tan. His career spanned the pericx:l when more rapid rreans of transportatioo enabled people to move fran continent to continent in a way not JX)Ssible before and to pursue a wide variety of interests. All five of Jclu1 W. Nevin ' s children who survived beyond young adulthood made notable contributions to the life o f their times . '!hey all inherited fran their f amily abilities and talents which they put to use in their ""'-'!1 distinctive way . The fact that they inherited money did not hinder them either! 48 • 1. Cf. "Notes on Nevin's Family I." New Nercersb.J.rg Review, Spring 1993 , p. 39. 2. ~, John C., "Dr. Nevin, The Theologian," p. 9 . A Paper read before the Kittochtinny ltistorical Society a t O1ambersburg, PA , Cctober 29 , 1903 . Press of the Franklin Repository, 1906 . 3. Fran a personal let'.:.er of John w. l'€vin to his rrother, Hrs. t1artha t1cCracken Nevin. rated t-By 28 , 1846. I n possession of the present writer. 4. Appel, Theodore. p . 763 . Philadelphia, the '!he child was narred Geor~ Herbert Nevin after the 16th century me taphysical {XIet George Herbert . '!he choice o f name must reflect John W. Nevin's interest in p:::>etry and the mystical side of religion . 5 . caerna.rvoo Place was duolished al:xlut 1960 . The site is presently o:::cupied by the building o f the [legel Israel Jewish congregation of Lancaster. 6 . Robert Nevin may have b=en oonfirmed ~lhile he was living in New York City before the Civil Viae or a t St. Jarres O1urch in Lancaster. parish records could yield an answer. 7. Nativity O1urch was greatly enlarged in 1887 and the original building was incorp:::irated into the fabric of the larger cruciform church seen trrlay. A few years later Nativi ty Church became the cathedral of the newly formed Diocese of Bethlehem. 8. The corresp::lf'ldcnce between Nevin and the Vestry is preserved at l ength i n the cathedra l's Vestry Book . 9. Ir. 1992 the Reverend John H. 'Ihanas , Assistant to the President of the United Church of Olrist for Ecutrenical Concerns, disrovered a Renaissance triptych belonging to Robart Nevin and his sister, Hartha sayre , i n the Cleveland Art Museum . 10 . Bishop satterlee was r espons ible for the pl ans and beginning construction of the Hashington cathedral where Robert Nevin's grand nephew, Francis B. sayre, Jr. served as rean fron 1951 to 1978. A chief source of infonnatia'l about Robert J . Nevin is a beck. of short biographies of all the ma jor male rrembers of the Nevin f amily in the 19th century. The date o f publication, the author, aOO publisher are not given. A personal inscription indicates that :-mtha Nevin Sayre gave the volurre to her son John Nevin Sayre for Christmas in 1912 . I t is in the IX'Ssessioo of John Nevin sayre 's daughter , Faith sayre SChindler. ! am indebted to her for allowing me to consult this !.xxlk and use information frern it. 49 lIN John R. \'Jeiler D.lring the course of my research into the family of John ','1. Nevin I becall"e acquainted with Hrs . Faith Sayre Schindler of New Providence, NJ. She is the daughter of the Reverend John Nevin Sayre, whan an older generation may recall as the long tirre head of the Fellowship of Reconciliation. Since Sayre was a grarrlson of John W. Nevin, Hrs. SChindler is Nevin ' s great granddaughter. en my last visit to ~trs. Schindler she gave me a packet of materials which belonged to her father who received them fran his aunt Blanche Nevin. Inclooed in the collection are 110 letters written to John 1"1 . Nevin by family and friends fran roughly 1825 to 1841. In addition there are three letters written by Nevin himself and in manuscript form an address entitled "Revealed Faith and Vital Religion" delivered at "The Reunion of the Presbyterians of the annberland Valley" held at QaJ...-ville, PA. E. V. Gerhart's !1i!frorial given a fter Nevin' 5 death is printed in this issue of the New '!here are also numerous clippings an::l. arti cles dealing It is my hope that Sale day Nevin will be the subj ect of a full length biography. Appel's The Life and l'lork o f John Williamson Nevin, published in 1889, is a very i.mp:Jrtant work but obviously dated. I intend to deposit Mrs . SchiOOler's collection in the Archives of the Historical Scciety in Lancaster. Perhaps the day will cane when these materials will be of help to an aspiring writer who can bring to life once rrore the man who is so important to the ~~sburg Society. 50 • ALU EllTranuel V. Gerhart Professor of Systematic Theology, 1868-1904 Lancaster TheolOJical Seminary lancaster, Pennsylvania Of the Reverei'd John williClJlLS Not as much has t:en said of the personal Olristian traits of Dr. Nevin's character. 'l1\e time assiglted me in this memorial service I propose therefore to ClCrUpy by contemplating the rich legacy which his eninent spirituality in a service of !lOre than forty years has bequeathed to the RefonllE!d O\urch of our ti.!le • St..wng as was the intellect of Dr. Nevin, renarkable as were his gifts in the sphere of philosophy, and. distinguished as he was for free theological erquiry, yet neither the theological nor the philosophical was the furdarnental characteristic of the man. It was my lot to have been closely associated with our deceased brother for more than thirty years : for one year as a student, and subsequently as neighOOrs and frierrls, as f ellow teachers, members of the same faculty, "Embers of i.mp::lrtant OJIlittittees, when it was nE:=Ssary to latxrc together day after day, for weeks in successioo, aM. in other capaCities which I ned not particularize. en the basis of the knowledge gained from these varied persooal r elati For him God was first, first in his consci ousness , first for his will , and in his pursuits. God's existence, his presence, his authority, his holiness, his honor were for him living and constant realities. It appeared to me that the sense of God's presence and of his own personal responsibility to God were never absent fran his miM. I do not relrember that I ever saw h1rn so wholly absocbej in any question, philosophical or theological , social, secular or p:>litical, or so wholly occupied with cootroversial issues, that this sense of his personal relationship to God was for the time entirely in suspanse. He did not f orget himself, and then as it were wake up to fiM that his miM had not all the while ben an::horing in God. Of course his heart and mind were not always with equal force iJrbJed with the talCtioo of a spiritual habit. Like other believers his Orristian life had at one time more freshness and vigor than at another. But he was distinguished rather for an equable than a dlangeful experience. His seascns of depression did not arise fran a loss of the consciousness of God , or of God's presence , nor fran any wavering as to the divine ~e o f his life, rut fran the great difficulty which, at certain ep:x:hs in his history , he experienced in the endeavor to solve sane cb::Lrinal am. ecclesiastical problems . 51 . I have been laying stress 00 Gcd in his religious c~act~, no~ ,on JC!Sus O'irist; and I have dale it designedly. For it was the 1n rel1g1on which Dr. Nevin especially ~sized , I do not for~et , the •.;o rn made flesh, the Otrist o f Gcd , became with him the pr ~nc1 ple , ~ of all souOO philOSO{ilic thought. But Olrist w~s th1S fundarrental pnnc1ple, not tscause he was the infalli ble teacher of lIlfalli ble truth, nor because he had acCXluplished the work of re4s21Iptioo ; but the Olrist was the living center of all realms of truth because he was the personal Gcd i n hlIMO flesh. In Jesus Dr. Nevin recognized the organiC unity of the spiritual and ~e natural, of the heavenly and the earthly, of the true Q:d and true, man 1n one ~son. He insisted on the veritable humanity of our lord in a Ufi100 of the human and the divine that was indissoluble. But the significance and value of the incarnation lay in the fact that the son of Man was God. FellOdShip with Jesus, the son or Mary, the seoond. Adam, was not mere l y the way of access to GOO, oot fello.rohip with Jesus was fella.lShip with God himself. The words of Jesus uttered God's voice. Dr. Nevin was a man of deep and varied religious experi ence. His religiOUS sensibilities were lively and keen. At times the simple reading of GOO ' s WOrd , at the family altar o r in the public sanctuary, woul d so profoundly !OOVE! his mind and heart, that he could with difficulty proceed with the ser.'ice. Now and then it was necessary m:::mentarily to pause in order to gain the mastery CNer his emotions. Yet of his emotions he never spoke. His religious feelings were never the subject of his words, though a t the very time he might be speaking with intense feeling. Nor did he put any value on f eelings. He was ever looking away fran himself to Gerl, the Gcrl manif est in the Olrist, concerned only that he might know Gerl, receive his life, drink his spi r i t, and by fell Dr. Nevin was noted f or his COlSCientiousness. This trait in his spiritual character was the natural oonsequence of the emphasis which he spontaneously and constantly p..it on the divine in religion. '!he l aw of Gcd revealed by the personal word was for him the supr eme and the only authority. As the needle turns to the pole, so his conscience turned towards the right. And he dreW a broad line bet't."3en the right and the expa:lient, the oonvenient and the useful or the politic and prudent. He was as innocent of shrewdness as he was of cunning, and he was so consi&!rate of the right that he rare l y entertained prulential consideraticns. M'Ien he betrayed hesitatioo or indecisim as to a practical questim, it was not tscause he was weighing personal interests, but because i t was not definitely evident to his mind what were the deman:1s of 52 truth and r ighteousness. Yet Dr. Nevin never spoke of his conscience nor professed to be conscientious. His words on mral questions , whether i~ the classr cx:xn, on the flcor of our O'Iurch courts, or in the so:::ial cir cle were ~ec:tive. Not unless an .attempt was made to influence his conduct contr~y to h1S J udgrrent of nght, d1d he make dlrect reference to his personal sense of obligation. His strict conscientiousness '""as seen in the whole course of his life. It shone forth at every step, in his I·lords , in his d::ds, in his attitude and bearing 00 all occasions. Sane of his best friends no less than hi s opponents often differed with him widely in opinioo or j1rlJnent; but no one who kne\oi the simplicity and C' For nearly a half century he lived among us . At different times he f ill ed successively all of the positions of trust which were at the disposal of the Reformed 01.Urch . How numerous and perplexing the duties which were inposed up:n him, in teaching, in college discipline , in writing, in fighting the:>logical battles, in breaking a pathway upwards through ignorance , OOubts, fears and errors towards a higher level of Olristian truth, often amid clouds and darkness , often with one hand pressing forward and with the other overthrowing his foes; yet do I not utter the heart-felt cawictioo of this asserrbly of ministers, elders and people when I say that he held the confidence of the church and the world in his suprerre love for truth and righteousness with unshaken firmness to the end! Such a testimony to the living authority of Gc:xi , to the absolute claims of Olristianity, to the pa.1eI" of divine right and of the human conscience is a legacy of inestimable rroral worth. Such a life of moral integrity and personal uprightness is a spiritual benediction. 'the personal religion and the p:>sitive rroral character of OJr revered teacher and spir itual father was constantly nourished by the use of a ll the means of grace. Of his a ttendance upon public worship, his observance of the sacraments and his habits of prayer I shall not speak. Instead I shall dwell on his appreciation and constant use of the \fiord of God . 'nle Bible, including all the canonical books of the Old Testament and the New Testament, was for him a means of grace of inestimabl e spiritual value. 'nle written word was for his heart the Divine word. In it divine life pulsated. Human words were instinct with heavenly realities. The Bible he studied historically , gngLaiXtically, exegetically, and theologically. At different periods of his history all these phases and r elations of scripture were patiently and thoroughly examined . But these interests, however solem and impor tant he believed them to be, were not matters of greatest IT()Ill2nt. He read and studied the word of God pr inci pally for his spiritual edification. I believe that this kind of scripture s tudy was characteristic o f his whole Otristian career, begi nning with his youth , and extending through the long years of professional activity onward to old age. Dr. Nevin was a constant devotional s t udent of the Bible. He prized it solely 00 account o f its manifold inexhaustible wealth of divine truth. He studied it in Hebrew and Greek, in English, Latin, and German . He read, and read the Wor d in the or iginal tongues , perhaps as frequently as in his native English, and often with greater preference. rus deci ded predilecti on for I3ible study distinguished !ti.m l Did time pennit, these reflections en the religious life and spiritual experience of a great and gocd man might be e»tended with interest and profit. But I shall oot transgress assigned limits. SO r ich a there can scarcely be handled without running into Wldue length. I shall therefore close with one concluding remark. 'Ille secr et of Dr. Nevin ' s notable history was his 9Qdliness. Great as he was in the different spheres of thought, he was still greater in the sphere of positive Olristian faith. He has rendered manifold valuable servi ces to the church into which he was transplanted, and his influence in the line of Olristological 'Iheology will tell upon generations yet unb:::>rn i l::ut our chi ef cause for gratitude to Gcxl is this: that in the course of his providence he l ed into the fold of the Reforliled Clurch a man of genuine spirituality, of godly sin'plicity, of IOOral heroism and o f thorcughly upright character - - a man a long the pathway of whose life bl 54 'llIE MERCERSBURG LlTURGIClIL ~: 1\. CALL R:R c:e.J'ECITVE WCRSHIP Thanas G. Lush Pastor, Trinity United O'lUrch of O\rist Biglerville, Pennsylvania 'nle first step tcrward a new liturgy in the German Refortled OlUrch occurred when the group converged in Hagersro-m, 11aryland for the Syno:l meeting of 1820 . 'Ihe Maryland Classis recO\ll'll8nded to Synoo. that the lit urgy of the church be ill\proved, transl ated into English and its printing be praooted. OJer the next twenty or so years there were several rrore attempts at revision but for various reasons no action was taken and no revision was fully endorsed. At the 1848 Synod of Hagerstown a o:::ttlluttee of five was again appointed to explore the revision o f the liturgy. In 1849 this cOil,Littee recamended to the Norristown Synod that a new liturgy be wri tten. 'Ibe Norristown Synod appointed a new COlltlittee to examine the liturgical literature of the Re forned chw:diCS and to prepare for the next meeting of Synod a plan or outline of the proposed new liturgy with specimens . '!his cottu.ittee consisted of the fo llowing: John Nevin, Philip SChaff , Barnard W::llff, Eli as rierner, John Banberger. Henry Harbaugh, Joseph Berg , "'1i1l1am Heyser, John Bucher, Caspar Schaefer and George \'felker . With the app:>intment of this OOIIl1Iittee, the forty year t/ercersburg liturgical controversy was !:orn. The erosion of li turgical practice in the Refoned churches had been in evidence f or sane time. "Vest Refallied churches of the mid-nineteenth century had been so loog dcminated by the effects of Puritan and Pietist hostility to liturgical, fontlS that they were no longer aware of their a.m liturgical heritage. " John Nevin argued frequently that nineteenth century Protestantism was excupyi ng a quite different p:lSition fran that of the RefonrErs on matters of church , ministry and the sacranents. 'lhe ron-liturgical view of warship made i ts way into the Refomcd churches through the Congregaticnal1st Anglicans, the left wing of the Puri tans. John Forbes, the leader of the Conqreqationalist Anglicans, "used no s~ forms of sp::lken prayer , adoptirl9 a Separatist conceptioo of worship. " '!his becane the prevailing Congregationalist vi ew. '!hus the ~lOrship of Congregationalist New England in the 1630s and 1640s is the first firml y established practice of non-liturgical worship in a Re f ormed church. By the 18th century, liturgical prayers, the Ct ed, the Gloria Patri, the Lord's Prayer and even Scripture reading had been eliminated widely in the Refoilied churches. Philip Schaff, writing in 18S8, wllha,ted that "in time anti-liturgical prejudices asslDTed the ~ of tradition which is difficult to oven::u,e especially in the united States. " '!he noo-liturgical fires heated up considerably with the advent of the revival maetings . The goal of the preaching and singing was to bring individuals to a "personal decision." 'lllose under conviction of guilt were i nvited to "wile forward" and sit on a rrourner ' s bench or as Nevin called. it, the "anxious bench . " Revivalism, presupposi ng a largely unconverted audience, developed a lit urgy or worship service much different fran that appropr i ate to a congregation assumed to be Olristian. 'lhe Olurch was an assembly of religiously inclined neighlx>rs rather than people of the Hord. Cbjectivity. in wor ship yielded to sentirrentali ty . "The p..Irpose of worship becalile conversl.?\i r ather than corporate oblatioo in res(X)nSe to God's gift in Jesus Qlrist. " under revivalistic evangelicalism, liturgy became an instrunent in the hands of the clergy am. choir through which the conversion of the l ost was hopef ully gained. It was i n this clerically OCminated worship context. that the 55 • Mercersburg liturgico.ll lrovelllcnt OO Even before the appointment of the lit'.u-w revi:;i':>rl ~rrnittec. in .1349, .100n Nevin was cri.tiquing what he ~led the new measures ~f ~evlVallsm through his pamphlet '!he Anxious Bench. Nevin presented an obJectlve as opposed to subjective view of faith . His objection to .the " 1'ICW looa~ur e;'.6 I b..li l d up the interests of O1ristianity in a firm and sure ~Iay . A ministry apt to teach; serm:::lO.S full of unction and light; faithful , systematic instructioo . •• catechetical training .. . these are agencies by whim alone the kingtfrn of G:x1 lIay be expected to go steadily f orward among any people. Nevin advocated the "System of the catechism" whereby cllildren growing up in the church urrler the "faithful application of the means of grace" would be 8 "quickened into spiritual life in a conparatively quiet way," unable to trace the pro:::ess of change. under the "System of the catechism, " "the ordinances of the sanctuary, being of divine insti t utien , are CC9arded as channels of a power higher than themselves; and are administered accordingly with suc~ earnestness and diligence as bespeak a proper confidence in their virtue. " Nevin believed that it was 00 this sarre "system" that the 16th century Reformers r elied. It was the lost lit urgies and rrethods of the Reformation period and the primitive catholic Olurch that l1ercersburg called attention to and reoolllllerrled to be the basis of the New Li turgy. In the sumrer of 1852, tile Mercersburg members of the liturgy ccmnittee (Nev.!.n , SChaff and Tlnnas Porter) net weekly to shape the general design of the liturqy. 'lbey brought before the Balt.i.roore Syncx3 of that sarre year seven principles en which the New Liturgy was to be CXJI1Structed. Tnese principles were as follows : 1. '!he liturgical worship of the primitive church , the lit urgies of the 3rd and 4th century Greek and Latin churches along wit.'1 16th cent ury liturgies I«:Itll d be the basis for the proposed lit urgy . 2. Special reference IoIOUld be given to the Palatinate Liturgy of the 16th cent ury. 3. '!he ancient catholic and Reforned Li turgies would be reproduced in a f ree evangelical spirit arrl adapted to the particular wants of t...'1e age and denaninatioo. 4. To avoid m:::notany , the liturqy used rrost frequently, such as the r egular service en the Lord s Day, should embrace several forms . Sane of these liturgies should be with responses and serre without responses . ('I11ese adaptaticns app?ared 00 the Provisional Liturgy but not in the final order for worship . Nevin was interested in what ought to be, not what would sell . ) 5 . 'Ihe language and style ought to be scr iptural but not doctrinal in tcne. (Schaff believed i t possi b le t o be both theol ogically sound and i nspirational. ) 6. It was to be a family lit urgy or a people ' s devotional took as opposed to a p.llpit manual. I t was hoped that hare use would f ac i litate the introductioo of the liturgy. 7 . 'Ihe New Liturqy ooght rot to interfere wi th the proper use of ext.errplraneous prayer rut ra~ regula te and pralote it. 'I11is final item 56 • becarre the focal point of cootrover sy in the New Liturgy. Althoogh the saltinore synod approved these guidelines, when the New or Provisional Liturgy was printed, extemporaneous prayer had been deleted. 'l1lese principles were outlined by Schaff in the r.iarcersburg Review in January of 1867. SChaff had hoped that these principles would lead to a liturgy which \oO.I!d be "a bJnd with the ancient catholic church and the Reformation, and yet be the1 As the work 00 the New Liturgy caltinued, it hecarre evident that the liturgy being deve1q::ed was not an independent discipline rut a oonsequence of theology, and in particular the theology of Mercersburg. Ho.iard Hageman has rxlted that what made the Mercersburg liturgi cal rrovement notable was "the fact that it ytS the first liturgy in the Refomed Olurch to articulate a theology . " Hageman notes that it was primarily the theology articulated by Nevin that catre through in the liturqy. Nevin held a three-fold view of the theology of liturgy. Liturgy is in the first place Ou'ist ological or O1ristocentric. The key to a rorrect kn:Jwledge of the world, lMI1 and GOO. is set before us in the "mysterious constitution of His blessed Pe.rsoo. " In the secorrl place, liturgy rroves "in the b:>scrn of the Apostle's Craed." He saw the Creed as being O'Iristological, laying out the fwmrrental facts of Olristianity growing forth fran the mystery of the Incarnation. And in the third place, liturgy is chjective and historical. Nevin saw the theology of Mercersburg not as a system of subjective notioos born of a human mind rut as the apprehension of the supernatural ~¥ th under the form of an actual "Divine manifestation in and through Clu"1st." Thus the New Liturgy was vie~ as an altar liturgy. It was a scheme of worship 1n whim all the parts were seen as being l:x:RJnd together by a CUIiOOIL relatioo to the Olristian altar. 'nE I:ottan line of all true Christian warship is the mystical presence of Olrist in the Holy rucharist. EVen when the Eucharist is not celebrated, it is the focus of worship and thus worship requires an altar rather than pulpit liturgy. It (the liturgy] teaches that the value of Otrist's sacrifice never dies, but it is perennially continued in the ~ of His life. It teaches that the outward side of the sacrarrent is mystically b:Jurrl by the fbly Glast to its inward invisible side; so that the undying poo,,oer of Christ' s life and sacrifice are there for all who take part in i t with faith. It teaches that it is our duty to appropriate this grace and bring it before GOO. as the only ground of OW:;3trust and coofidence in His presence. All this the Liturgy teaches. Ha9E!fMIl interprets these words of Nevin to rrean that "the liturgy is the means by which ~ O:Jngregation on earth shares in the ministry of the 11 ving Olrist in heaven." 4 In O1rist, those worshiping are brought into the presence of Q:x:l. himself as with him they plead the nerits of his passi on. The conclusioo then is that war:ship is objective and does not rely on the impressions or feelings of the worshiper. 50nething happens in the liturgy: O1rist is ~t and working rErl ILptively 00 behalf of his dlurch. 'nle Order of worship which was the end product of the Marcersburg liturgical effort was seen as a true Altar Liturgy. I t was not simply a ~ of religious service but "a scheme also o f religiQlS thought and belief." 57 . '!be Me.rcer'sOOrg adherents f0un:3. themselves defending an objective. view. of worship in a predaninantly subjective age. 'llley, defenOOd the lltury-l~l service as a sacred bond of union beb)3en the different ages of C1rJ.st s church 'Ihe liturgical service guarde::l against the excesses of arbitrary freE"~I;L that were so evident in the (Xlpllar "New />'easures." Liturgy ,was a CCJrLSerVative P'l".... r in Ckx:trine and discipline, ~ organ for ~e .exercJ.se ,of tile ~al priesthood and "tlva artistic form wluch til,e very splnt of S?CJ.al worship instinctively assumes and which will charactenze even the worshlp of the ~ in heaven as a canplete hannony of united thanksgiving am praise. " 'lbe attempt to guard against the excesses of subjectivism resulted in the deletion of extemporaneous prayer fran the New Liturgy even though it had teen affiLuoo at the Synod of Balti.Joclre. '!be service was to be calducted from the altar until the hyrm prior to the serm::n, at which ~ the pastor entered the pJlpit. 'lh.e worship service was directed to focus en the Eucharist even if it were oot celebrated. Alternative forms for Sunday worship were eliminated to avoid o:nfusion and to facilitate learning the New Liturgy. An ut=tUll battle was in store for the New Liturgy to be adopted. Its controversial nature was evidenced by the fact that for years it was referred to as the Provisiooal Liturgy. ~ition was so strong that an alternative prop:::ISal for a new liturgy ,!fan that of the MercersbJrg rrcdel was developed by the western Synod in 1863. To reduce the intensi ty of the controversy, the New Liturgy became kna.m as for the Reformed Cllurch, eliminating the ....urd Synod of 1866 approved for ptovisional use for Refouted Cllurch.. all~1ed the use of the liturgy of the Western Synod which p..ovided extempxatleOUS prayer. '!be General Synod of 1878 established a Peace COlliussien that sooght to bring roth sides together and 'lbe Directory retained the o:mtent of ~ prayer and roore subjective oorship. Nevin, Schaff and their ~cersburg colleagues revised and revived the liturgy along theoretical rather than p:!litical lines. 'lbey knew that they would face major objections particularly from the IlIestern Synod . At times the opp:;6ition was bitter, aCCUSing them of Rananizing. Ho./ever, the ~1ercersb..irgers held to the objective nature of the faith, a Crristocentric o,.,urship and the essential nature of traditim. 'lhe.ir liturgical effort was not a cuiipilatioo of materials but the expression of their thEOlogy which they held to be orthcdox and true. In their thinking, living and ....urship, they Io.'&e theologically advocating the work of Gc:d. over the work o f h1Jli'an beings. 'lh.e New Liturgy which they prepared and defed- d did not, ho..oever, attain full acceptance nor widespread use. In every age the church !I'llSt struggle with the subjective influence U{X)l"1 its theology and worship. 'lh.e call to ....urship is not a call to have one ' s n:e1s rret nor to feel good, but a call to becane centered in Gc:d. . Worship is a centering of our lives in Gc:d. so that we do not live eccentrically. In the ccnteupJrary "HaJ:PY Meal" culture that revolves around personal happiness and contentment through the satisfaction of personal deSires worship easily capitulates its center in Gc:d. to a focus Q1 the whims ani feelings of the worshipers. '!he influence of the culture is constantly eroding the objective nature of the Olristian faith expressed in liturgical warship. 2 'lhe call to worship i s also a call for personal involvement not just drervation. WOrship is not an occasi on for the ego to be fed' rut to be redirected . I n worship we 'listen t o the voi ce of Bei ng ' and becare answers to i t. 'lhe selCis no longer the hub of realit y as sin seduces us i nto supp::>sing . \~ are trained f ron infancy to relate to the world in an exploratory, expl oitive way, r e f using and grabbing, pJShi.ng and pulling, fretting and inveigling. As \mo..ter and user the ego is a predator. But i n worship we cease being predators who by stealth awroach everyone as prey that we can p.,lll into our center; we respord to the center. \oJe are pr ivileged listeneri!fVrl resporrlents who offer ourselves t o Gerl, who creates and rooee-s. '!he liturgical r esponse of the congregatioo should be robust and vigorous in the conviction that the prayers will not only be fulfi lled by God in the future but that the fulfillment is already present in Christ . A basic lesson fran the ~~cersburg liturgical CXlI'ltroversy is the nC"'E'Ssit y of thinking theologically about the worship service, for the exntent and form of the worship service reflect an underlying theology. 'lbe constant question to ask i s whether the worship reflects the faith , pr aise and joy in the God who acts to save and red ee m his people. Is the IooUrship fcx:used en God's ends or those of the pastor , who r equires visible results to f eel that sanething i s being aCCCIIllplished? can the Io.':)rship be scriptural, objective, historical, persooal and i OOigerous wi thout succumbing to the excesses of subjectivism? In aiklitioo to presenting the chall enge to think theologicall y, Mercersburg sheds light on the need to educate IooUrshi pers. SOund liturgies will not s~ly be accepted !:ecause they are sound. 'lhose l eading worship must keep before the congregatioo the r easons f or the lit urgy l e s t i t !:ecorre an empty form f or routine mumbling. 'nlose IooUrshiping must grasp that the challenge i s to be centered in God ; worship is not the quest to feel good . Finally, the Mercersburg liturgical CCIltroversy places before us the questioo of unifonnity. Must unity in thought, the premise that worship is objective, require that there be unifonnity in practice? Does objective warship centered 00 God's action abso lutely require fixed praye r or can there also be ro::m for ext.erTiJOraneous pr ayer? can the Creed be sung as we ll as s p:>ken? HcMard Ha~ has wri tten that ref orrrcd Io.':)rship is "of the ~c1e not. of the temple." ~Ie are a pilgrim peopl e on a j ourney. As ~ Journey we w1.ll experience changing historical and soci ological oorditions that will requ1:e theological evaluaticn and a steadfast detenninati cn f or warship that 1.S Otrisro:entric , roth historical and objective and emJxxlied in the Apos tle ' s Cr : j, 5' 1. Jares H. Nichols, (Philadelt:hla: '!he 2. Ibid ., p. 95. 3. Philip SChaff, "The New Liturgy , " Mercersb.lrg Review Vol. 10 (fb. 21858) , p . 203. 4. Jack M. MaxWell , of ~\ercersburg 5 . Jctm W. Nevin , The Publication Office of the German ) . 6. Ibid. , p . 116. 7. Ibid. , pp. 11 8-119. •• Ibid. , p . 130. 9 . Ibi d. , p . 133. 10 . Schaff, p . 220 . 11. """"'" G. IIageMn , Pulpit and Tabl e (Richmond: John Knox Press, 1962), p . 92 . 12. Nevin articulated his theology of liturgy in his article "'lheology of the New IJ.turqy," f:Ercersburg Ieview Vol. 14 (January 1867) , pp . 23- 66. 13 . Nevin, "'Iheology of New Lit urgy , " p . 48 . 14. Hagman, p . 96 . 15 . Nevin, "'n1eology of New Liturgy," p . 24. 16. Schaff, p . 208 . 17. 'lhrough westward migratioo German RefoLll ::3 settlE!!lEnts apPeared far outsi de the gSCYJTat:hlcal boundaries of the Eastern Synod. The western Syncd was therefore established. These two Synods met every three years f or what was kno.m as General Synod . The first General synod met in NovEmber of 1863. 18 . Ellgene H. Peterson, Revers ed'lliunder (San Francisco: Harper & RaW , 1988) , pp. 68-69. 19. Hageman, p. 104. 60 - BIBLICXiRAPHY ,. Hageman, Ho.4ard G. Pulpit arv:l. Table. Richroond : Jd1n Knox Press, 1962. 2. 3. Nevin, John W. O1arrbersl::urg : PUblicatioo Office of the GeIman 1844. 4 . Nevin, John w. "Theology of the New Liturgy." l"erce.rsbm~ Review Vol. 14 (January 1867) : 23-66. 5. Nichols, Jarres Hastings. 6. Old, Hughes Oliphant. Atlanta : John Knox 7. Peterson, Euqene H. ReVersed'IhlUlder. San Francisco: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1988. 8. SChaff, Philip. " ~New Liturgy." M2rcersl?lrg Review Vol. 1 0 (No. 2 1858): 199-227. 61 • • "'lHE l'L6'l' BENJTIFUL AND PElU'FX.T LITURGICAL SERVICE:" A REV'.IE>I' AR1'ICLE Benjamin Griffin President and Professor of Liturgics United Theological Seminary of the 'IWin Cities New Brighton, Minnesota 00'-. oth . $91.80 Stulents of the MercersOOrg t-bveTent recognize irm"ediately these words in a l etter Philip Schaff wrote to his wife fran Londoo. in 1854: sunday I spent the greater part of the day with the Irvingites. In the IlClrning I fOlUld their beautif Hageman and Maxwell are convinced that SChaff did not simply stumble into the ~ Square cathedral of the Catholic Apostolic Church in 1854 . The (Alreri.can) German RefOIlied Church, under the creative leadership of JOOn Williamsal Nevin and Schaff, was in the midst of devel oping a ne\ 'Ihe catholic Apostolic Church, which came into being in the 18305, was couplex in its theology, church order, and worship. As mysterious as this might s::m to late 20th century mainstream church people, the Catholic ApostoliC 01Urch was at once ''high church, " charismatiC, and adventist. In its liturgy it was deeply influenced by the early church and the Anglican Book of COition Prayer. Yet "speaking in tongues" was COiiilon in services. It had a strange doctrine of humanity and highly stratified orders of ministry. It was also ecu.trenical in spirit and had a particular sympathy for Eastern Orthodoxy. 'Ihe Catholic Apostolic Olurch was both a church and a religiOUS IlOVelleOt. By that I rrean tilere were, for example, 0lUrch of England bishcps, priests, and laity who were "sealed" by the Catholic Ap;:lStolic Omrch but who also remained active in the Anglican Olurch. While Anglicans COiliprised the largest group there were also p!L"sons fran the Church of Scotland (Presbyterian), Methodists, and Irrlependents (O:::llgregationalists) . ED;Jlish t=ee rs, Members of Parliarrent, at least one aanira l , and a prime minister' s son were involved with the church. As one might susr, :ct, it is not an easy task to understand and describe such a cauplex theological, ecclesial, and liturgical m:wem:nt. 'Ibe Catholic Apostolic 0lUrch has often bnn caricatured by its detractors and glossed over by sate of its admirers (including Schaff and Nevin). What is unique aboUt Q)lUllba Graham Flegg's study (based 00 his doctoral thesis) is 1) ~ and family 62 - trembers were part of that church (he is now a call1lllnicant of the 0rthcx:J0x OlUr ch, and 2,) he had been given access , denied to other scholars, to original source matena! s . '!here can 00 no doubt that all futuro studies of the catholic A!::os~olic Olu ~ch , will be dependent upon Flegg . The great regret and scandal of thlS book 15 lts cost: S91.80! And that fran a major university press! Nevertheless , all seminary libraries should pJrchase the vollL'DS! . Readers of '!he ~~cersbJrg Review wi 11 find 5ecticn IV Liturgy especially interesting. Here one can evaluate to what degree Schaff am Nevin follow Calvin's eucharistic theology and to what extent they are influenced by the doctrine of real presence of the Catholic Apostolic Q'lUrch . While we rray be put off by that church's typolO;Jical basis for ~rship , we should also learn fran its attempts to fashi on rituals relevant to people of the day which are yet grounded in traditioo. The history of the O\urch is filled \~ith the unexpected turning point. John \\'esley , educated in one of the ancient universities and a high church Anglican sacramentarian, was deeply influenced I::rt ~bravian hyrrns and had his heart "strangely wanred" listening to a reading of Luther ' s conmentary on Ronans . Is that any .o;tranger than Schaff, educated in the new scholarship of the German university , discovering the "rrost beautiful and perfect liturgy" i n a charismatic , adventist, highly oeremonial church in Lo1don in the mid 1800s? Perhaps, stranger still to those who do not believe in the Providence of the gcod God is that a new theology and a new lit urgy would be birthed out of the tiny seminary of a small imnigrant church in the new ' 'Ihe Catholic Ap:>stolic church barely exists today because in the late 1800s, due to its adventist convictions, it ceased to ordain clergy. Readers of 'lbe Mercersburg Review are assl.lllV?;d to be comnitted to the central place of worship in the life of the church. As I often tell students in liturgy classes , one never knows what may hapPen through the grace of God when the church gathers in liturgical assembly. When they rose that Sunday in 1854 , did the liturgical leaders in Gordon Square know the e ffect of their church's worship on a young Ge.nnan American theological professor who would s i t in a pew? 1. While James H. Nichols, Ho.Iard Hageman citation I use Martin Maxwell 63 • THE MERCERSBURG scx::rETY "nle Mercersrurg SCCiety has been formed to uphold the concept of the Olurch as the Bcdy of Christ, E.Vangelical RefoI.1l'ed, Catholic, Apost olic, organic, developrental and connectional. It affirms the ecumenical creeds as witnesses to its faith aM. the Fllcharis t as the liturgical act fron which all other acts of worship and service emanate. "nle society pJrsues conteufXxary theology in the Olurch and the world within the oontext of Mercersburg Theology. In effecting its p.rrpose the SOCiety provides opp:>rtunities for fella.lShip aM. study for parsons interested in MercersbJrg Theology, sponsors an annual convocation, engages in the publicatioo of articles and l::lo;:)ks, stimulates research and correspcndence aroong scholars 00 topics of theology, liturgy, the sacraments and ecurrenism. 'lb:! New MercersbJrg Review is designed to publish the proceedings of the annu.a.1 Cbnvocation as well as other articles on subjects pertinent to the aims and interests of the SCCiety. l'Bnbership in the Society is sustained by $25.00 par annum for general nf!aVership, and $10.00 par annum for students, payable to the Treasurer: '!be Rev. James H. Gold P. O. Box 207 IckesbJrg, PA 17037 Manuscripts subnitted for publication and b:::lOks for (X)Ssible review should be sent to: R. Ho..rard Paine, Etlitor Reading, PA 19607 Manuscripts shruld be typewritten arrl druble-spaced. Three copies of each manuscript are required, aloog with a self-addressed and stamped envelope for their return ~f f~ unao:eptable. ~ first page of the manuscript shoul d c:arrr, the p~ . )S~ title ,~. the author s nane. Under the name should appear the identihcahon line, gl.ving the title or fX)Sition the i nstituticn and the location. " SUperior numerals in the text sho..lld indicate the placement of footnotes. 'Ibe footnotes themselves should be typed separately at the end of the manuscript. Examples of style for references may be found in a past issue of '!he New Mercersburg Review. -