From: hedrick@farside.rutgers.edu (Charles Hedrick)
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: AR, ANSWERING -------------> Sean II
Date: 21 Dec 92 20:35:41 GMT
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.

On whether Christians agree on the "essentials":

Clearly it depends upon what you mean by essential.  I'd say that all
Christians agree on the areas that are needed for salvation, i.e.
repenting of our sins, depending upon Christ's death for forgiveness
of them, and living as his disciple.  At that level I think you
include just about everybody who would be likely to call themselves
Christian.  In at least some churches, the Apostle's Creed is used as
a definition of Christian.  I believe it is accepted by everybody who
would be involved in these discussions.  (I'm tending to test my
comments by thinking of Catholics, liberal and conservative
Protestants, JW's and LDS.  I don't know enough about Christian
Scientists to be sure what creeds they would accept.  Quakers would be
iffy, but they themselves aren't sure whether to call themselves
Christian, so that probably is OK.)

The next level beyond that is probably the Nicene Creed and Chalcedon.
This gets at the Trinity and Incarnation, which I think most
Christians consider central doctrines.  These are accepted by
Catholics and Protestants of all types.  They exclude only groups that
in my view are somewhat at the margin, e.g. JW's and LDS.  (In fact I
think many LDS could say the Nicene Creed without problems --
Chalcedon would rule them out.  I believe JW's couldn't even say the
Nicene Creed.)  Many Christians would probably prefer to use the term
Christian to refer to this set of people.

The next level begins to get into doctrines that as far as I'm
concerned define specific approaches within Christianity.  This is
where we get justification by faith alone, the role of the Pope,
Maryology, and the inerrancy of Scripture.  By and large I don't think
people believe that these doctrines are essential for salvation.
There may be conservative members of each approach that would say
that, but I don't think it's the majority view in any area.  This is
the categoy into which I think most of your questions fall.  Going
down the list:

 - I'm not sure how many people would say that belief in the 
	Trinity per se is necessary for	salvation.  As you point
	out, for several hundred years, no one believed in it.
	If someone simply asserts the NT statements about Jesus,
	and refuses to deal with formal theology at all, I think
	it would be hard to say that they are in trouble.  However
	the Trinity was developed to answer questions that came
	up later.  Generally questions like that don't simply
	disappear.  Most groups that reject the Trinity don't
	simply take a naive NT view -- they take one of the
	positions that the Trininty was developed to combat.
	I personally do not believe that being an Arian will
	necessarily damn you, but I do think that it's denying
	one of the central tenents of Christianity.

 - baptists will all say that baptism by immersion is commanded
	by God.  But I think it's pretty unusual for them to
	say that people baptized only as infants will be damned.

 - similarly with salvation (justification?) by faith.  As far as I 
	can tell, the official Catholic view (from Trent) and the most
	common evangelical view are now essentially the same.  The
	primary dissent is by Calvinists and Lutherans.  While
	they believe that election and grace are important, I
	think it's pretty unusual for them to say that all those
	Catholics and Southern Baptists are going to be damned
	because they don't accept justification by faith alone.
	(Yes, I know Baptists will claim to believe justification
	by faith, but if you look at what Luther actually meant
	by the term, it turns out that most Baptists actually
	hold the position that Luther was arguing against.)

 - currently I do not believe any major group says that you
	have to receive sacraments from an authorized priest to
	be saved.  I believe Catholics who tried to maintain
	this position in its literal form have been excommunicated
	for it.

My own preference in terminology is to use the term Christian for
anyone who looks to Jesus Christ as Lord and savior (the wider
definition), but to identify the basic Christian doctrines as roughly
equivalent to the second list, i.e. the Nicene Creed and Formula of
Chalcedon.  I realize that there's a certain inconsistency in this,
since it means that I acknowledge Christians who don't believe certain
Christian doctrines, but that seems to be the best match to reality.