Learning from History— Churches and Moral Discernment
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Learning from History— Churches and Moral Discernment Wijlens / Shmaliy Sinn Wijlens 2 Many of the tensions between and among churches—and Christians them- selves—can be traced to the different, even conflicting, positions they take on important ethical issues that face the churches and society. Yet, as history demonstrates, the traditions themselves grow, develop, and even reverse their convictions and authoritative teaching about matters of ethics. In this volume, that historical dynamism is opened and probed for clues about the occasions for and criteria of changes within traditions. Here expert historians, theologians, and ethicists insightfully examine, for example, usury, slavery, mar- riage, suicide, as well as freedom of religion, apartheid, and involvement in war and in peace. They show how over the centuries, individual traditions have deep- ened, developed, and occasionally, overturned their teaching in pursuit of a more authentic moral discipleship. CHURCHES AND MORAL DISCERNMENT 2 CHURCHES Myriam Wijlens, a Dutch Roman Catholic theologian and canon lawyer, is a full professor at the Catholic Theological Faculty and former vice-president of the University of Erfurt (Germany). Her research focuses on necessary reforms of canonical structures in light of ecumenically relevant ecclesiological developments. On behalf of the Pontifical Council for the Promotion of Christian Unity, she serves on several ecumenical dialogues. Vladimir Shmaliy is Associate Professor of Systematic Theology and Philosophy of Religion at the Russian Orthodox Church Postgraduate School and at the MEPhi University (Moscow). An archpriest of the Russian Orthodox Church, he has served in many ecumenical dialogues and as a secretary of the theological commission of the Moscow Patriarchate. His research has ranged widely including in theological anthropology and religion and science. Simone Sinn is Programme Executive with the WCC Faith and Order Commission and Professor of Ecumenical Theology at the Ecumenical Institute, Bossey, Switzerland. She holds a doctorate in the- ology from the University of Münster, Germany, and is ordained in the Evangelische Landeskirche in Württemberg. Her research and publications have centred on ecumenism and interreligious relations. FAITH AND ORDER PAPER 229 ECUMENISM / ETHICS Learning from History EditedEdited by Myriam by Myriam Wijlens, Wijlens Vladimir and Shmaliy, Vladimir and Shmaliy Simone Sinn Churches and Moral Discernment Churches and Moral Discernment Volume 2 Learning from History Edited by Myriam Wijlens, Vladimir Shmaliy, and Simone Sinn Faith and Order Paper No. 229 CHURCHES AND MORAL DISCERNMENT Volume 2: Learning from History Copyright © 2021 WCC Publications. All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in notices or reviews, no part of this book may be reproduced in any manner without prior written permis- sion from the publisher. Write: [email protected]. WCC Publications is the book publishing programme of the World Council of Churches. Founded in 1948, the WCC promotes Christian unity in faith, witness and service for a just and peaceful world. A global fellowship, the WCC brings together more than 350 Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and other churches representing more than 560 million Christians in 110 countries and works coopera- tively with the Roman Catholic Church. Opinions expressed in WCC Publications are those of the authors. Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible, © copyright 1989 by the Division of Christian Education of the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the USA. Used by permission. Cover design, book design, and typesetting: Michelle Cook / 4 Seasons Book Design Cover image: Vassily Kandinsky, Circles in a Circle (detail), 1923. ISBN: 978-2-8254-1736-2 World Council of Churches 150 route de Ferney, P.O. Box 2100 1211 Geneva 2, Switzerland https://www.oikoumene.org Contents Contributors vii Preface Myriam Wijlens and Vladimir Shmaliy ix Introduction Simone Sinn xiii USURY 1 1. Did the Roman Catholic Church Change Its Mind on Usury? Yes and No 3 Christina McRorie 2. Serving Both God and Mammon? The Orthodox Response to Usury in Byzantium 20 Antigone Samellas 3. Calvin and the Ban of Usury 40 Cornelis van der Kooi SLAVERY 51 4. Ecclesial Justifications and Resistance to Slavery in British Colonial America 53 Tamara E. Lewis 5. Against Their Established Interests: Proslavery Co-optation of Antebellum White Methodism 65 R. Drew Smith 6. Moral Discernment and Slavery: The Case of the African Methodist Episcopal Church 85 Dennis C. Dickerson CHURCH – STATE – SOCIETY 103 7. On the Role of Authority in Churches‘ Moral Discernment during Apartheid 105 Dirk J. Smit 8. Sources of Authority: The Latin American and Brazilian Lutheran Context 127 Valério Guilherme Schaper 9. The Development of Moral Discernment in the Evangelical Church in Germany in Light of National Socialist State Crimes 139 Thomas Martin Schneider 10. Change in Catholic Moral Teaching: The Right to Religious Freedom in Dignitatis Humanae 160 David G. Kirchhoffer vi Contents WAR AND NONVIOLENCE 175 11. From Passive Nonresistance to Active Nonviolence: A Change in the Mennonite Tradition 177 Anne-Cathy Graber 12. Is the Participation of Christians in War Ethically Acceptable? An Orthodox Approach on the Basis of Two Patristic References 190 Miltiadis Vantsos and Kristina Mantasasvili 13. Christian Conscientious Objection: Moral Debate and Discernment in West German Protestantism in the 1950s 204 Hendrik Meyer-Magister WOMEN IN LITURGY 219 14. From the Pauline Admonition to Remain Silent to St. Ephrem’s Creation of Women’s Choirs in the Liturgy 221 Mor Polycarpus A. Aydin MARRIAGE 233 15. The 1930 Lambeth Conference and Artificial Contraception: A Paradigm of Anglican Moral Discernment 235 John Gibaut 16. Marriage in the Presbyterian Church in Cameroon: African Polygamy 244 Emmanuel Anya Anyambod 17. “Till Faith Do Us Part….” The Reality of Interfaith Marriages and the Response of the Methodist Church in Malaysia 258 Hermen Shastri SUICIDE 273 18. Funerals after Suicide: Human Sciences Cause New Perspective for Catholics 275 Michael Karger 19. Suicide: A Coptic Orthodox Church Perspective 295 Wedad A. Tawfik Appendix: Faith and Order Study Group on Moral Discernment: Members 305 Contributors Rev. Dr Emmanuel Anyambod Anya, Presbyterian, Professor and Vice Chancel- lor at ICT University in Yaoundé (Cameroon) H.E. Dr Polycarpus A. Aydin, Metropolitan for the Archdiocese of the Nether- lands of the Syriac Orthodox Church (The Netherlands) Rev. Dr Dennis C. Dickerson, African Methodist Episcopal, Reverend James Lawson Chair in History, Vanderbilt University, Nashville (USA) Rev. Canon Dr John Gibaut, Anglican, President of Thorneloe University, Sud- bury (Canada) Rev. Dr Anne-Cathy Graber, Mennonite, Co-director of the Chair of Ecumeni- cal Theology at the Centre Sèvres Jesuit Faculties, Paris (France), Chemin Neuf Community Dr Michael Karger, Roman Catholic, Staff at the Department for Doctrine and Education, German Bishops’ Conference (Germany) Dr David G. Kirchhoffer,Roman Catholic, Director, Queensland Bioethics Centre, Australian Catholic University, Brisbane (Australia) Dr Cornelis van der Kooi, Reformed, Professor Emeritus in Systematic Theology, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, distinguished Lecturer ESAA/EURAC Erasmus University Rotterdam (The Netherlands) Dr Tamara E. Lewis, Assistant Professor of the History of Christianity, Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, Dallas (USA) Ms Kristina Mantasasvili, Orthodox, Ecumenical Patriarchate, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Theology, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece) Dr Christina McRorie, Roman Catholic, Assistant Professor of Theology at Creighton University, Omaha (USA) Dr Hendrik Meyer-Magister, Lutheran, Akademischer Rat in Systematic Theol- ogy and Ethics, Ludwig-Maximilians University, Munich (Germany) vii Dr Antigone Samellas, Orthodox, PhD in history (Yale) specializes in the chris- tianization of the late antique East, with particular interest in the history of ethics, history of emotions, and intellectual and social history of the Eastern Mediterranean, Athens (Greece) Rev. Dr Valério Guilherme Schaper, Lutheran, Professor of Systematic Theology, Faculdades EST, São Leopoldo (Brazil) Dr Thomas Martin Schneider,Evangelical Church in the Rhineland, apl. Pro- fessor of Church History, Director of the Institut für Evangelische Theologie, University Koblenz-Landau (Germany) Rev. Dr Hermen Shastri, Methodist, General Secretary of the Council of Churches of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia) Rev. Dr Vladimir Shmaliy, Orthodox, Associate Professor of Systematic The- ology and Philosophy of Religion at Russian Orthodox Church Postgraduate School and at the MEPhi University Moscow (Russia) Rev. Dr Simone Sinn, Lutheran, Professor of Ecumenical Theology at the Ecu- menical Institute at Bossey and Programme Executive at WCC Faith and Order in Geneva (Switzerland) Dr Dirk J. Smit, Professor of Systematic Theology, Stellenbosch University, South Africa, Uniting Reformed Church in Southern Africa (URCSA), pres- ently Professor of Reformed Theology and Public Life, Princeton Theological Seminary (USA), PCUSA Rev. Dr R. Drew Smith, Baptist, Professor of Urban Ministry and Director of Metro-Urban Institute, Pittsburgh Theological Seminary (USA) Dr Wedad A. Tawfik, Coptic Orthodox Church, Professor of Theology at the Institute of Coptic Studies, Cairo (Egypt) and at the Coptic Seminary (Faculty of Theology)