The German Catholic Church

Words are often the sources of misunderstandings and even of conflicts, and the word 'catholic' is no exception. One must always return to the primary meaning of this word; it is not primarily religious or spiritual in nature. The first part of the word is the Greek root cat- which we find in catalogue and cataract and catapult.

The second part of the word comes from the Greek root hol- which is manifested in words like holistic and hologram. The word 'catholic' means "with respect to everything" or "concerning everything" or "all-embracing" or "universal" - and we see this in nonreligious expressions like "he is a man of catholic tastes" which simply means that he has eclectic tastes.

So, then, when the church claims to be "catholic," it is merely expressing that it is a collection of all those who follow Jesus, regardless of where they live, which language they speak, or which culture informs their social context. That we have a "catholic" faith is simply saying that God loves all humans, that Jesus offers forgiveness to all humans, and that eternal life in heaven is made available to all humans.

The confusions begin to emerge because one particular institution is called the "Roman Catholic Church" - a paradox created by the words alone. The word "Roman" refers to a concrete specific place, and connotes certain traditional social structures which accompany it, while the word "catholic" denotes just the opposite, something which transcends a particular physical situation.

The phrase 'church universal' or 'invisible church' is often used to refer to the collection of all people who are followers of Jesus, regardless of which, if any, specific 'church' or denomination they embrace. The word 'church' generates ambiguity, as does the word 'catholic' - and the two of them together create a downright conceptual jungle.

Although we use words to attempt to clarify and articulate our concepts, they often risk doing just the opposite. It is at least a step toward clarity to distinguish the "Roman Catholic" church, which is a specific institution, from the invisible universal "catholic" church, which is a set of people with no regard to membership in a particular organization or denomination.

Mark Dever offers a historical insight into the development of this terminology. Going back in history, before the phrase "Roman Catholic" emerged, which it did after Luther's Reformation in the 1500s, we can see the word 'catholic' being used when there was less confusion or ambiguity surrounding it:

As far as we know, Ignatius of Antioch was the first person to use the word catholic in relation to the church. In his letter to the Smyrnaeans, written around A.D. 112, he wrote, "Where Jesus Christ is, there is the universal church." Early Christian writers believed in the catholic church — that Christians everywhere trusted in one God, confessed one faith, received one baptism, and shared one mission. In that sense, catholic meant "real" or "authentic."

The earliest institutional churches were geographically defined: the Chaldean Church, the Ethiopic Church, the Syrian Church, etc., and so the Roman Church was simply institutional Christianity as it occurred approximately within the boundaries of what was, or had been, the Roman Empire.

There were different varieties of Christianity, but each was a sort of monopoly within its geographic area. Only after the Reformation did a situation arise in which different variations of Christianity existed side-by-side within the same region. Despite the notion of "religious wars," they coexisted peacefully for the most part, and when so-called "religious wars" arose, they were often motivated by quite nonreligious political ambition, poorly disguised by a thin veneer of religious vocabulary.

A new vocabulary was needed for this situation, a situation of various flavors of Christianity heterogeneously occupying the same space. Thus arose a colorful spiritual landscape of Lutherans, Calvinists, Anglicans, and Roman Catholics. Because 'catholic' is already three syllables, and 'Roman Catholic' is five, 'catholic' quickly became shorthand for 'Roman Catholic' - generating confusion. Generations of Lutherans, Anglicans, and Calvinists have stated that they belong to the catholic church, but not to the Roman Catholic church.

In addition to meaning 'authentic', the word also came to denote 'orthodox' - or, simply put, 'true' or 'accurate' - in contrast to institutions which might promote specious or incorrect ideas. As we saw, above, from Ignatius of Antioch, who died around 110 A.D., his notion of the church's catholicity meant that it was actually existing as a thing or occurring in fact, and not something merely not imagined or supposed, and that it was genuine, and not an imitation or something artificial.

Clement of Alexandria, who was born around 150 A.D., exemplifies this added layer of meaning - orthodoxy on top of authenticity - in a passage cited by Mark Dever:

There is one true Church, the really ancient Church, into which are enrolled those who are righteous according to God's ordinance ... The one Church is violently split up by the heretics into many sects. In essence, in idea, in origin, in pre-eminence we say that the ancient Catholic Church is the only church. This Church brings together, by the will of the one God through the one Lord, into the unity of the one faith which is according to the respective covenants (or rather according to the one covenant established at various times), those who were already appointed; whom God fore-ordained, knowing before the world's foundation that they would be righteous. The preeminence of the church, just as the origin of its constitution, depends on its absolute unity: it excels all other things, and had no equal or rival.

Another translation of Clement's thorny syntax confirms his perception of the tension between the one and the many: centuries before the Great Schism of 1054 A.D., and centuries before Luther's Reformation, there were divisions of other kinds, and while those divisions may have been quite real in the concrete functioning of institutions, and in the specific points of doctrinal statement, there is still a notion of the church's oneness:

From what has been said, then, it is my opinion that the true Church, that which is really ancient, is one, and that in it those who according to God’s purpose are just, are enrolled. For from the very reason that God is one, and the Lord one, that which is in the highest degree honorable is lauded in consequence of its singleness, being an imitation of the one first principle. In the nature of the One, then, is associated in a joint heritage the one Church, which they strive to cut asunder into many sects. Therefore in substance and idea, in origin, in pre-eminence, we say that the ancient and Catholic Church is alone, collecting as it does into the unity of the one faith — which results from the peculiar Testaments, or rather the one Testament in different times by the will of the one God, through one Lord — those already ordained, whom God predestinated, knowing before the foundation of the world that they would be righteous. But the pre-eminence of the Church, as the principle of union, is, in its oneness, in this surpassing all things else, and having nothing like or equal to itself.

Around 350 A.D., Cyril of Jerusalem nudged the word 'catholic' a little closer to its modern meaning, while yet retaining its previous meanings. He spoke of geographical diversity and social class diversity; he spoke of a church which is universal because it addresses those things which are precisely human, those things which all humans face or need. Mark Dever cites this passage:

It is called Catholic then because it extends over all the world, from one end of the earth to the other; and because it teaches universally and completely one and all the doctrines which ought to come to men’s knowledge, concerning things both visible and invisible, heavenly and earthly; and because it brings into subjection to godliness the whole race of mankind, governors and governed, learned and unlearned; and because it universally treats and heals the whole class of sins, which are committed by soul or body, and possesses in itself every form of virtue which is named, both in deeds and words, and in every kind of spiritual gifts.

As the followers of Jesus are called to clarify their task again to each new generation - semper reformanda - Mark Dever sees four challenges to clarifying the catholicity of the church in the twenty-first century. The church must overcome, first, provincialism: we are inclined to project our social, cultural, and geographic specifics onto the universal church, rather than seeing the universal truth of Jesus weaving its way through various traditions, cultures, and places; second, sectarianism: which is not to minimize or deny the significance of doctrinal and dogmatic differences, but rather to see what might be maintained and achieved in spite of them, as we work together on those tasks which God has assigned to us; third, racism: while much has been improved concerning this topic, much remains to be done, and the challenge grows as immigrants and emigrants flow through the continents of Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Americas; fourth, exclusivism: the Good News about Jesus is for all people, and no socio-demographic variable should exclude anyone from fellowship - marital status, income level, profession, etc.

A quick review of John's Gospel, chapter seventeen, or Paul's letter to the Ephesians, chapter four, will suffice as evidence from Scripture, despite the fact that the word 'catholic' or its Greek equivalent do not appear in the New Testament.

While millions of Lutherans, Anglicans, and Calvinists are not members of the Roman Catholic church, they are members of the universal invisible catholic church - as are millions of Eastern Orthodox (Russian, Greek, etc.), millions of Copts, millions who belong to the Chaldean Church or to the Syrian Church or to the Ethiopic Church. And, of course, equally, members of the Roman Catholic church are also reminded to remember that they are part of this invisible universal church.

The Real Bonhoeffer. Really.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer is appropriately considered one of the most significant Christians of all time. This consideration, to be sure, needs clarification in the light of a sense of spiritual equality in which God views all humans equally. Metaphysically, Bonhoeffer is no more important than any other human. Yet the role which he played in concrete, physical, specific history is a role with more significance than some others.

Yet those less significant, but equally important, roles were necessary to Bonhoeffer's role: Aaron holding up Moses' arms. Someone had to change Martin Luther's diaper, or there'd have been no Reformation. Someone had to teach Mother Theresa how to read and write, or there'd have been no world-changing mission in Calcutta.

Precisely because so much has been written about Bonhoeffer, the reader risks losing him. Bonhoeffer has been made and remade, into a liberal and into a conservative, into a Lutheran and into an ecumenist, into a German and into a global citizen, into a revolutionary and into a traditionalist. When a historic individual becomes an icon, the literary world can reduce him to two dimensions, and eventually to one. A pure symbol becomes subject whichever meanings are arbitrarily attached to it.

Consider JFK and MLK as quick examples. Which vote-seeking candidate will fail to praise both of them, and yet attach his own political agenda to both of them?

Thus we need to keep in touch with the specific and concrete details of Bonhoeffer's life, or we will lose him. He will become a symbol to be misinterpreted and exploited by successive ideologies.

To this end, biographies gain their value. Were it not for this danger, one might well dispense with biography. But the physical facts of the man's life act as anchors to keep texts, written by or about him, pegged to reality. One familiar with the daily routine of the Finkenwalde Seminary cannot seriously entertain Bonhoeffer as practical atheist. One versed in Bonhoeffer's academic life cannot embrace the view that, while he explored ecumenism, he abandoned traditional Lutheranism.

Recent biographies, notably one by Eric Metaxas, merit study as companions to Bonhoeffer's writings, and companions to the huge body of literature about Bonhoeffer. Writing about Charles Marsh's biography of Bonhoeffer, Timothy Larson muses about

the sheer unlikelihood of Bonhoeffer's emergence as the boldest opponent of efforts to Nazify the German church.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer was too young and too academic to offer serious resistance to the National Socialist regime of Adolf Hitler. He was a rich kid from an intellectual family. He enjoyed kicking around a soccer ball with seminary students. He had no real monetary income even to support himself.

But what power did Bonhoeffer wield in 1933? He was 27 years old, financially dependent on his parents, and virtually bereft of experience in the working world. His sole professional appointment was an unpaid, non-tenure-track position as a voluntary lecturer. Adjunct professors don't normally stand athwart emperors.

Yet Bonhoeffer was ahead of the curve, ahead of his peers, and ahead of the times. While many of his fellow clergymen and fellow theologians would take several years to learn exactly how evil Hitler was, Bonhoeffer seemed to sense it from the very first. And Bonhoeffer would resist it from the very first. Indeed, along with resisting Hitler, and eventually making plans to overthrow Hitler, Bonhoeffer would be faced with the task of alerting his fellow pastors to the evil and persuading them to oppose it.

Yet Bonhoeffer did. Within weeks of Adolf Hitler's rise to power, Bonhoeffer declared in public that the Führer was offering a false path to salvation — and, in private, that Hitler was an antichrist. When the Nazis called for ethnically Jewish Christians to be expelled from the churches, he alone insisted that the gospel was at stake. (Initially even Karl Barth, like other anti-Nazi dissenters who founded the Confessing Church, claimed that this was merely a question of church order, not a theological issue.) Marsh, director of the Project on Lived Theology at the University of Virginia, makes a convincing case that by 1933, Bonhoeffer was the most radical and outspoken opponent of Nazi church policy.

Bonhoeffer's sense of personal holiness and the strict ethical code by which he lived aided him in his opposition to evil - here again the daily routines at the Finkenwalde Seminary are worth noting: Bonhoeffer forbade seminary students from talking about anyone who was not in the room; this was Bonhoeffer's way of avoiding gossip and observing Luther's explanation of the eighth commandment. But Bonhoeffer also understood clearly that personal holiness earns nothing, and is in fact rubbish in God's sight. Yet personal ethical convictions prepare the soul for confrontation with evil.

Unlike the rumors that sometimes surround him, Larsen writes, Bonhoeffer was "so sexually innocent" that twenty-first century readers find it difficult to believe.

Even Bonhoeffer's physical relationship with his fiancée, Maria — whom Marsh says Bonhoeffer was "smitten" by — comprised only a solitary occasion when, as a prisoner, he kissed her on the cheek in the presence of the public prosecutor. In a late prison letter, Bonhoeffer observed that he had lived a full life even though he would die a virgin.

Connecting with Anglican, Reformed, and Roman Catholic teachers and friends, Bonhoeffer was willing to absorb ideas which passed his litmus test. Particularly interesting are his experiences with American Christianity: which aspects of it he rejected, and which ones he embraced. Larsen reflects on

how willingly Bonhoeffer learned from disparate ecclesial influences. He was a kind of theological hoarder. When he went to Rome, he did not react with disgust as Martin Luther had, but rather gained a new appreciation of the church's universal nature. One is supposed to have to choose between Adolf von Harnack and Barth, but Bonhoeffer managed to value them both. Indeed, to extrapolate, one might see Bonhoeffer's late musings on "religionless Christianity" as blending Barth's insight that "Jesus simply has nothing to do with religion" with Harnack's method of separating the kernel (of biblical truth) from the husk (of cultural and historical circumstance).

While wrestling with theology at the most rarified and abstract intellectual heights, Bonhoeffer was grounded by teaching confirmation classes to teenagers in gritty urban factory neighborhoods. One of his litmus tests for theological ideas was the reality of daily life for these ordinary people. Did any of those ideas help them, make a difference to them, or apply to their lives?

Bonhoeffer was disappointed by his encounters with seminary professors and students in New York in the 1930s. Dismissive of Biblical text and direct discourse about Jesus, these seminarians sought to be relevant but did so without intellectual or spiritual foundations.

Initially, Bonhoeffer was disgusted by American Christianity. He was bewildered and frustrated by theologians who did not care about doctrine and preachers who were not interested in the gospel. Everyone wanted to pontificate on social issues. In time, however, he came to learn that his fellow Germans were also half-wrong in refusing to recognize the ethical demands of the Christian faith. Moreover, Bonhoeffer found in the African American church a community committed to both gospel proclamation and social action. Why, at the tender age of 27, was Bonhoeffer the lone German minister who immediately saw the scandal of excluding Jewish Christians from the church? Precisely because his experience in America taught him to connect faith and practice.

Bonhoeffer also saw quite early on that he would probably die at the hands of the National Socialists. He absorbed this calmly and continued his work. He knew he was risking his life at least as early as 1938, when he took up contact with a broader circle of resisters in Germany, and 1939, when he chose to return to Germany from New York, aware that he was placing his life in danger.

Timothy Larsen argues that one of Bonhoeffer's main points "was that Christianity is not merely a matter of what one believes, but of how one lives." To which we might add, and how one dies.

As German Lutherans rested complacently in their commitment to faith alone, while turning a blind eye to suffering and injustice, Bonhoeffer pointedly preached a Reformation Day sermon on I Corinthians 13:13: "And now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is love." It turns out that even an unemployed 20-something can stand against the world when empowered by the Love that moves the sun and other stars.

While much has been made of "religionless Christianity," exactly what Bonhoeffer meant by that must be understood in light of his actions and in light of the way he lived his life. The eternal Jesus was so real for Bonhoeffer that religion, as a manmade institution, was often more a hindrance than a help. Bonhoeffer, like many Christians, had to overcome the church to get to Jesus.