Mortal Sin.
Being the theological misfit that I am– raised Roman Catholic, coming of age in a Modern Evangelical church, and converting to Lutheranism as a young adult– I am so often surprised at the things on which people are in disagreement.
For example, I can’t understand why all of Christendom doesn’t understand the Parable of the Seeds the way Lutherans do, it just seems so straightforward. I guess I’d have to admit never believing “once saved, always saved,” even though that’s what most of my friends have always believed is true and were shocked to discover Lutherans don’t. I was just as shocked (or better yet, confused) by their position.
Back to Mortal Sin. I read this post by the Rebellious Pastor’s Wife, and once again I was surprised to see that Lutherans (and perhaps most of Protestantism) really have a problem with the concept of mortal vs. venial sins. I knew that we didn’t really talk about it, but thought that was just a product of not being as concerned with doing an actual, sin-by-sin, confession as the RC church is.
So anyway, these are just my thoughts that are only slightly related to the R.P.W.’s post. But her post is so good, and very well researched as well as well written, that I needed to pass it on. My post is neither well researched nor well written, but I am excusing myself from that camp because most of the times I am sitting at the computer any more it is impossible to do much more that click-click-click. I am usually the bed for a snoozy infant.
Perhaps when I’ve had a moment to myself I can come up with something more meaningful on the subject. I’m not making any promises, though.
Devona,
Thanks for your comments and the link! I like what you have to say. It is amazing to me that as a life-long Lutheran, I never came across these terms in Lutheranism (and was definitely never catechized about them) until 4 days ago. Now, on Cyberbrethren, the terms are being bounced around in the theological discussion like crazy. Ever have times like crazy. Ever have times like that???
Last time I heard from you, you hadn’t had your baby yet. Congrats! The pics on your blogs are beautiful.
Thank you!
It’s strange to me how each tradition has its “pet” topics, and talks about them nonstop, like Law and Gospel, or something similar. But they also have theology on all these other topics that never gets talked about, except for every once in a while. Why is that?
It’s funny to me, as I’ve been talking with Rob, that a Lutheran (him) is complaining about Lutheranism being reduced to the Law and Gospel hermeneutic (and homiletic) and a Calvinist (me) is tired of Reformed Theology being reduced to the 5 Points. The five points are only 5 out of hundreds that could be made under the theological sub-category of soteriology within Reformed Theology. I’ve been using the term “the Reformed Tradition” lately to describe my full-orbed convictions (liturgics, homiletics, scripture, philosophy, family worship, psalmody, etc.). In doing so, I’m trying to distinguish my moorings from, say, the guy on the front of Xnity Today a few mos. back who thinks that wearing a “Jonathan Edwards is my homeboy” T-shirt means that he’s “Reformed”. There’s diversity, I know, in the Reformed Tradition, but dabbling in the doctrines of grace for a week or two and then buying the prerequisite paraphanalia from monergism.com or wherever is a long way from reading the Scriptures with the Heidelburg Catechism or the Scots Confession, for example.
It’s theological branding, I guess. “What do we have that you don’t? Well, since it’s ours we’d better keep talking it up so you’ll see how cool our thing is and want to come be like us. And then we can sell you the t-shirt too.” ;)
Maybe I’m being too negative.
I find myself, when talking in ecumenical groups, pointing out all of the non-distinctly Lutheran point of theology in which most Christians agree. I would never deny my Lutheran distinctives, and there is a place for talking about them, but I’m getting a little weary the those distictives being the bulk of my Christian conversation.
Maybe that’s a product of my theological misfit background too. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to think like a cradle lutheran.
Strangely, I think that I actually do think more and more like a “cradle” Presbyterian all the time. Although I have less distinct an image of what a cradle Presby looks like than I do a cradle Lutheran.
And as to distinctives, I actually think that there’s a Reformed theology of _________ for more things than most Presbies realize. I actually think that in our particular circles, we could stand to become more forthright about immersing our members in our distinctives. Maybe I feel that way because many American Calvinists are trying harder than most American confessional Lutherans to cast the nets broad and grab as many evangelicals as possible…it’s a PR campaign of sorts. I’m all for grabbing evangelicals, but then I say we “tradition” them, since evangelicalism almost by definition is anti-sectarian = anti-tradition.
So, in sum, I think Presbies need to not be so afraid to “be themselves”—but that doesn’t mean staying out of the evangelical conversation, but rather seasoning it at the least, and drawing folks to our tradition at best.