bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
Lead Us Not into Temptation
Authors: Baker Aelred 
Published: July 2007

Liturgy is a great thing for sending people to sleep. It does not matter how archaic a word or phrase in the liturgy is, or obscure or even downright nonsense, it can still be said, provided it is said or sung often enough. Witness the remarkable lines of some popular hymns. This is even true of such an exalted thing as the Lord’s Prayer, which has been said somewhere in the liturgy from the earliest times.Englishmen still say ‘hallowed’ long after the word has gone out of current use, largely because Englishmen have always said ‘hallowed’ since at least the days of King Alfred. This is not an English eccentricity. The Greeks have always recited the Lord’s Prayer with the word epiousios, which is known to have been unintelligible to second-century Christians. Nobody then and nobody since has ever heard of this word in any other context, and nobody is really sure what it means. And yet for century after century the Greeks have gone on saying it.If this is so of single words, it is more so with whole phrases. The meaning of the line ‘lead us not into temptation’ is no less obscure than epiousios. The words themselves do not present any difficulty, but taken together they seems to imply something that is quite unthinkable. Are we really meaning that God would lead us into temptation, if we didn’t pray to him not to ? This certainly troubled the early Latin Fathers when they were engaged on providing a satisfactory translation for the Western Church. They frequently softened the shock by inserting something like: ‘do not suffer us to be led into temptation’ (ne patiaris nos . . .). But the novelty wore off, and as this cushioning interpolation was not in the Greek, St Jerome stuck on ne nos inducas . . . , and the Western Church was quietly lulled off to sleep by the liturgical anodyne of centuries of repetition.
Development of Doctrine: Smokescreen or Explanation?
Authors: Lash Nicholas 
Published: July 2007

‘The problem of orders must be looked at . . . facing squarely the question whether the new situation calls for a new policy in the Catholic Church. This policy would include a careful determination of the arguments behind the Bull Apostolicae Curae and a candid judgment whether the development of doctrine has superseded the theological assumptions of 1896.’ That statement was followed, a week later, by a letter in The Tablet from Fr Edward Quinn: ‘May one express the hope, in good time, that this really will be a candid judgment ... if a new investigation shows that the assumptions have been superseded, let it also be clearly admitted that the decision was mistaken. Even if the Bull was not infallible, Pope Leo XIII declared in the most forceful terms that Anglican Orders were null and void, and followed this up by a letter stating that the decision was irrevocable. Development of doctrine cannot mean that one statement was true in 1896 and its opposite true in 1980 or whenever we come to revise our former conclusions.’ The following week, Bishop Clark, Roman Catholic Co-Chairman of the International Commission, wrote: ‘Fr Quinn touches the nerve of this discussion when he seeks to clarify the relationship of Apostolicae Curae to a development of doctrine. What, however, has guided the thinking of the commission is the principle that any development in doctrine must be consistent with its past.’In spite of the very general title of this paper, my aim is extremely restricted. I do not propose to discuss past or present theories of doctrinal development, nor the relationship between notions of ‘development’ and related notions such as ‘progress’, ‘growth’ or ‘evolution’. Although I shall be obliged to touch on it at one point, I do not propose to discuss in detail the problem of the normative status to be accorded to the New Testament witness and to subsequent moments in the doctrinal history of the Church.
Religion and Social Work: Diocesan Rescue Societies as a Case Example
Authors: Timms Noel 
Published: July 2007

The subject of this article invites (and has received) discussion at a high level of abstraction, but the basic question can be posed quite simply: are religious social work organizations (such as the Diocesan Rescue Societies) religious organizations that undertake social work or social work organizations that are religious? To some this will appear an unhelpful contrast, but I hope to show that analysis in these terms yields fruitful results. Clearly, the question is based on certain assumptions, the most important of which lies in the discontinuity between religion and social work. Such an assumption runs counter to some commonly held ideas concerning the relationship between these two. These ideas are, I believe, mistaken, but I cannot at this juncture do more than make a brief outline of some of the main themes in what I would consider an adequate history of the relationship between social work and religion.Such a history would have to deal with at least three important themes. Firstly, the practice of religious protectionism and denominational exclusiveness, which is difficult to reconcile with the universalism implicit in social work, will require consideration. Historically there have been strong traditions, not only that particular religious groups ought to care for their own, but that their members would suffer penalties if they received help from ‘non-believers’. Thus, in 1677 the York meeting of the Society of Friends refused help to a member who had applied to the Lord Mayor, whilst in ancient Jewry a Jew living publicly on non-Jewish charities was considered to be like a pork eater and was disqualified from testifying in court.
Against ‘Enlightenment’
Authors: Holbrook David 
Published: July 2007

Not long ago I found myself on a platform, organized by the Young Publishers’ Group, together with Sir Robert Maxwell, Mrs Mary Whitehouse, and Sir Basil Blackwell, speaking on the problem of censorship. It was a horrifying experience, because the nature and outcome of the meeting were predetermined. It was predetermined by the intolerant dogmatism of ‘enlightenment’. Those who spoke against censorship resorted to facile declarations combined with facetiousness, as if any objections to complete permissiveness could only be ridiculous. On the other side individuals tried to be serious: but they were so selected and set side by side that they were made to appear to discredit one another. In any case, the amount of time available to each was so limited that no one could begin to say anything relevant or meaningful. I could myself have talked for an hour on the subject, in the endeavour to point out some dangers, and some fallacies, by which time I would have but nibbled the edge of the problem of hate in culture. But it was evident that the gathering did not want anything of the kind. It did not really want the issue debated. It wanted merely a ratification, by a kind of circus, of its own ‘enlightened’ prejudices.Often, thus, what seems to be a real debate is really nothing of the kind. Some time ago The Guardian ran a series on the permissive society. I wrote an article and sent it as a contribution. It was rejected—and I came to find that the series was not even planned and produced by the feature editorial staff. It was organized by the advertising staff, in combination with a television project. Here we glimpse the vested interests behind ‘permissiveness’. If one does get an article published it is often so badly cut as to be unrecognizable —an experience I have had with both New Society and The Times.
Faith and Revolution
Authors: Eagleton Terry 
Published: July 2007

A good deal has been written, in the pages of New Blackfriars and elsewhere, about the points of theoretical convergence between Christianity and Marxism: their shared practical-materialist humanism and historicity, their common goal of an eschatological liberation from alienation through powers embodied in the dispossessed and so on. The question I want briefly to raise in this article is where, given all this, the two perspectives diverge.To enumerate a series of doctrines held by the Christian and rejected by the Marxist is clearly no answer in itself to this problem. Marxists manifestly differ from Christians in rejecting God, the Virgin Mary, the eucharist, hell and any number of other such beliefs, but this can’t in itself constitute the decisive point of divergence, for the simple reason that a Christian is not a humanist who subscribes simultaneously to a set of transcendental propositions. No doctrinal difference can in itself supply the point of divergence, since Christian faith isn’t an intellectualist affair; if faith is to mean more than a subscription to certain categories which can be tacked on to the Marxist perspective as a kind of surplus value, it must manifest itself in a praxis peculiar, in some sense, to Christians.Most current attempts to distinguish Christianity from Marxism by virtue of the Church’s commitment to a transcendental perspective which cuts below and beyond the Marxist’s perspective seem to run this risk of emptying faith to an intellectual extra. Unless that transcendental perspective can be realistically ‘cashed’ in a qualitative difference of life-style and historical practice, it remains a redundant category, a merely theoretical divergence which can be contemplated but not appropriated.
Interchurch Marriages
Authors: Reardon Martin 
Published: July 2007

Episcopal Conference of England and Wales based upon the Apostolic Letter Issued Motu Proprio on 31st March, 1970, by His Holiness Pope Paul VI determining Norms for Mixed MarriagesUntil the publication last year of the Motu Proprio and the Directory by the Episcopal Conference of England and Wales mixed marriages looked very different to different people. It depended where you stood. In fact there can be few states of life which appeared so different according to viewpoint.If you were an average Roman Catholic priest or bishop brought up in the One True Church with a firm Catholic tradition, they were a major problem. More than half your marriages were mixed and the majority of the non-Catholic partners were merely nominal Christians. One of your primary concerns must have been that the Catholic partner continued to practise his or her faith and the children were brought up as Catholics. The Catholic Church in this country has been the only major Church which has increased in numbers in recent years, and, apart from the Irish immigration, the children of mixed marriages have probably accounted for the largest part of this increase.If you were an average Anglican priest or bishop brought up in a firm Anglican tradition, mixed marriages with Roman Catholics were a minor, but very sharp, problem. You came across few of them where the Roman Catholic practised his religion, but the ones you did meet showed that ‘One True Church of Christ’ at its most intransigent, intolerant of the conscience of the Anglican partner. You were tempted to be as intolerant in return, leaving the couple as bewildered and unhappy pawns of a different colour trying to make love in the middle of an ecclesiastical game of chess.
What is the Point of Being a Roman Catholic?
Authors: Wicker Brian , Gregor Ian 
Published: July 2007

‘A clean, well-lighted place’—the phrase occurs readily enough to anyone visiting Holland today and it has its own modulation when thought of in connection with contemporary Dutch Catholicism. Here, if anywhere, we can see translated into coherent and consistent practice much of the spirit of the Second Vatican Council, and it is hardly necessary to say that the notion of a Church as a whole seriously attempting to embody that spirit and not just paying lip- service to it cannot be other than impressive. A visit to Holland provides an opportunity to see some of the ‘progressive’ theological thinking in the Church ‘in action’, as it were—thinking which made us conscious certainly of ‘the well-lighted place’, but also, and more unexpectedly, of the shadows which fell across it.Two propositions central to modern theological thinking are the importance of establishing a view of faith as a personal commitment and recognition of the pluriform cultures in which we live. And so it is not surprising to find these assumptions shaping contemporary Dutch Catholicism.With regard to the first, in almost every conversation we had, words like ‘authenticity’, ‘maturity’, and ‘personal commitment’ occurred with unfailing regularity. Celibacy, to take the most obvious and topical issue, was felt to be significant only if it was a freely-chosen, maturely-pondered vocation. The individual had to accept it as the only mode of life in which his personal and social fulfilment could be envisaged. Celibacy as an obligatory pre-requisite for the priesthood or, at the least, intimately bound up with its meaning and function, was seen as a legalistic intrusion into the private conscience of the person concerned.
Satan and the Failure of Nerve
Authors: Yates Roy 
Published: July 2007

It is an interesting exercise to trace the development in the character of Satan that takes place in the Old Testament. In the earlier strands himself, while in the later strands, when the problem of evil had become more acute in the experience of the nation and of the writers concerned, the evil and suffering inflicted upon them is attributed to supernatural beings other than Yahweh. By the time of Jesus this ‘failure of nerve’ had resulted in a complex demonology and satanology as men were borne down by this ‘cosmic totalitarianism’. In the Old Testament itself there are comparatively few allusions, let alone direct references, to hostile evil powers; a fact that is made more surprising when considered against the background provided by the demon-riddled world of Mesopotamia. Nevertheless we see this development beginning and growing. In this respect the figure of Satan is of great interest because in the role ascribed to him we have the clearest example of a development which begins with his work as ‘adversary’ and member of the heavenly council and builds up through clearly discernible stages to a supernatural enemy of God and man who organizes a kingdom of evil in opposition to God.The conception of Satan as an individual and superhuman power occupies but a small space in the literature of the Old Testament. From the relevant references we gather that he in no sense fulfilled the role of the evil and subversive power ascribed to him in later Jewish literature.
R.W. Southern on the Middle Ages
Authors: Luscombe David 
Published: July 2007

When Mr Southern produced The Making of the Middle Ages in 1953, he illustrated it with photographs and was praised for the way he scooped up such a revealing collection of personalities and instances. Now in his new general work on Western Society and the Church in the Middle Ages, the photographs have been displaced by graphs and tables, and the selection of ‘moments’ in the life of the medieval Church is disclaimed in favour of a study of the interplay and tension between medieval society and its Church, and of a study of the continuous adaptation of the institutional modes by which the medieval Church attempted to satisfy the changing requirements of society. All too often ecclesiastical history lapses into the history of the organization and life of the Church as seen from the inside, and no doubt this is the image which the phrase ‘Church history’ evokes in many minds, but what is here studied is the history of the Church looked at from the viewpoint of society at large. Already by the ninth century western Church and society were so closely identified that those outside the Church were usually outside society also, but there is no risk of confusion here if one grasps the fact that throughout the medieval period elements in the Church continually tried to tune its responses to changing social demands.This book is structured according to a pattern of threes. Each of the five essays which form its core is planned in relation to the differences which separate a primitive age (c. 700-c. 1050) from an age of growth (c. 1050-c. 1300) and an age of unrest (c. 1300- c. 1550). Each essay is unquestionably a masterpiece. That on Byzantium and the West pursues the double theme of Rome as the source of western unity and the source of division in Christendom as a whole. The essay on the papacy shows theory evolving in relation to social change.
From Priesthood to Marriage
Authors: Bebb Andrew 
Published: July 2007

It seems strange to think in terms of ‘conversion’ when reflecting upon the experience of leaving the priesthood. The transformation, of the priest into the husband and father has been called many things, A ‘betrayal’—that was a bishop; a ‘defection’, an ‘act of madness’ a ‘second adolescence of the late thirties’, a ‘good riddance’, but hardly a ‘conversion’. Yet, for me, that is exactly it.I think it is worth the trouble to try to explain why. Not least because the witness, both theological and personal, of a growing number of stable, happy husbands and fathers who were once priests may be of positive value in the midst of the Church. We think so, anyway. Our families meet regularly. One resolution we all share: to love the Church and to meet the occasional rebuff without bitterness. Howsoever we may be regarded, and institutional rejection is surely understandable at the moment, there is no doubting that we do increasingly present a new phenomenon in the life of the Church. We are convinced that we have more than embarrassment to offer to the Church, but something creative and fruitful. Perhaps it may lie in the emergence of trained theologians who are also devoted and happily married men immersed in the secular society. Theology has surely limped long enough in the idealistic world of the professional celibate.Let me offer my own reflections, anyway, as a first contribution. If one word could express the whole new orientation of my own world, it would be ‘incarnational’. And this in an experiential context. My own saddest experience of priesthood was directly contrary. This may be a commentary on my own inadequacy, but yet I feel that it is the obvious defect of the Church ministry as a whole.
From Adenauer to Brandt: Church and State in Western Germany
Authors: Lomax Michael 
Published: July 2007

Bearing in mind Vatican II pronouncements on the desired relationship between Church and State, the Catholic Church’s relationship with the West German State appears well-nigh ideal. In Western Germany all Churches are by law disestablished, but most of them, including the Catholic Church and the Evangelical Church, enjoy corporate legal status (Gemeinschaften des öffentlichen Rechts) in the same way as trades unions and similar bodies. This gives these Churches legal recognition and allows them to enter into legal agreements with the State. The legal relationships between the Catholic Church and the West German State are laid down in the so-called Reich Concordat of 1933 between the Holy See and the German Reich. Although promulgated under the Nazi government, it is, with a few modifications, still legally binding. Furthermore the West German constitution (Grundgesetz) guarantees freedom of belief, conscience, religious conviction, and the right of the Churches to give religious instruction in State schools. Those Churches with corporate status are allowed to gather Church Tax on the basis of government tax-rolls.So far, so good. But in fact the picture is more complicated than it appears at first sight, as is shown by increasing criticism from both Catholic and non-Catholic quarters of the Catholic Church’s relations with the State since the war. The German mind is quick to draw the distinction between de facto and de jure (cf. the debate over the recognition of the GDR), and some have said that although there is no de jure establishment of the Churches in Western Germany, the Catholic Church has been as good as established de facto since the war. Such critics draw attention to the close working relationship between the Catholic Church and the Christian Democrat (CDU/CSU) governments of the fifties and sixties, the effects of this relationship on post-war legislation, the Churches’ privileged financial position, and the influence of the Catholic Church on the pattern of German education.
The Uniate Model and Anglican Ministry
Authors: Echlin Edward P. 
Published: July 2007

Anglicans and Roman Catholics are exploring the Uniate analogy as a model for reunion of their Churches. In this paper we propose to discuss briefly the development of the Uniate analogy and, thereafter, to suggest a way for Roman recognition of Anglican ministry.Proponents of the Uniate model point to an impressive precedent in Gregory the Great’s commission to Augustine in 597. They argue that Gregory favoured a distinctive patrimony for the Church of the Angles. Obviously this precedent should not be pressed too far. Subsequent Popes, such as Vitalian and Gregory VII, were less favourable to pluralism and more inclined to uniformity than was the first Gregory. Nevertheless, Gregory’s commission to Augustine of Canterbury does provide a useful precedent that might well be endorsed today.‘My brother, you are familiar with the usage of the Roman Church, in which you were brought up. But if you have found customs, whether in the Roman, Gallican, or any other Churches that may be more acceptable to God, I wish you to make a careful selection of them, and teach the Church of the English, which is still young in the Faith, whatever you can profitably learn from the various Churches. For things should not be loved for the sake of places, but places for the sake of good things. Therefore select from each of the Churches whatever things are devout, religious and right; and when you have arranged them into a unified rite, let the minds of the English grow accustomed to it.’The pallium given to Augustine by Gregory connoted recognition of a Roman primacy, a recognition that continued for nearly a millenium. Since the Reformation the Archbishop of Canterbury has served as a pastoral centre of unity for the Church of England and, later, for the world-wide Anglican communion.
Two Novels: Notes on the Work of John Fowles
Authors: Tatham Michael 
Published: July 2007

Even in our present state of enlightenment it is relatively uncommon to find a novelist who can treat the physical climax of a love affair so brusquely—‘A few moments later he lay still. Precisely ninety seconds had passed since he had left her to look into the bedroom.’ It is the more remarkable if the girl stretched on the bed has not only engineered the loss of her virginity and purchased a small Toby jug —now in the author’s possession—but is actually a divine enigma. Place such a episode in the shadow of a West Country cathedral in the middle years of Victoria’s reign and it becomes as ironic as it is pleasing.It has been my recent experience on belatedly reading The Collector and The French Lieutenant’s Woman to realize that there is something to be said for not reading books when they first appear. There is the chance that one may more easily recognize the development of a coherent attitude, and it is the essence of my discovery that John Fowles is writing a more unambiguously religious novel than has been generally appreciated. Primarily, his treatment of his material differs in a marked degree from the methods of such writers as Graham Greene, Salinger or Mauriac, in that he creates in his characters a dimension of allegorical potential which cannot be precisely distinguished from their ordinary humanity. It appears to be a new approach, and one that stands—if at some remove—in the line of Bunyan and the medieval Morality. Throughout The Collector, Fowles’ first book, the allegory is implicit and muted; and this, I think, is an attitude one would expect in a writer who had still to establish his narrative powers and was perhaps less than fully aware of the ultimate direction of his abilities. In his preface to the new edition of The Aristos Fowles tells us that his purpose in The Collector was to ‘attempt to analyse through a parable some of the results’ of what he sees as a ‘confrontation’ between ‘the Few and the Many’.