"Take These Gifts...Make Them Holy..." - A Meditation on Thoeotic Ministry

As I labour in the vineyards of academia, I thought it would be nice to share the fruits of my toils, here in the form of a final reflection/meditation paper I composed for David Yeago as part of our seminar on "Theologies of Salvation." We were asked to speak to the pastoral implications of the various accounts of soteriology we encountered; the following draws primarily on The Life in Christ by 14th-century Byzantine theologian Nicholas Cabasilas, St. Bernard's treatise "On Loving God," and the Sacred Meditations of 17th-century Lutheran great Johann Gerhard. This is definitely more of an article than a post, but I pray it offers as much delight in the reading as it did in the writing.

~

An old Vincentian priest who used to preside at our weekly Thursday evening Eucharists at the Denver Catholic Worker was fond of attributing to Karl Rahner the belief that “each human being is the unique and unrepeatable expression of the creative love of God.” When he presided at table, during the Great Thanksgiving, he would often pause over the words “take these gifts; make them holy; may they become for us the body and blood of Our Savior Jesus Christ,” taking care to enunciate the words “these gifts…make them holy…may they become for us…” and as he did so, his eyes and hands would drift from contemplation of the uplifted host to gaze upon the small rag-tag assembly of old nuns, young upstarts, mentally ill residents, drug addicts playing clean for a meal, and all the other jagged edge of the mosaic of the Body of Christ. His intent was clear: what we were about to eat was sacred, but not more nor less sacred than what we would become in the partaking of it.

Father Tom was a liberal Catholic in every sense of the word. Yet, I think in this subtle but profound gesture from Christ’s sacramental to His ecclesial body, he ingrained in me spiritually and in my desire what our present seminar has given me words to express in my intellect and tongue. My transgression of Roman Catholic Eucharistic policy not withstanding, Father Tom moved from second order claims like Rahners or Augustine’s famous “become what you are,” and in worship drew us into a participation of the highest theological order, enfleshing Nicolas Cabasilas’ claim that “there is nothing so sacred as a human being to whom God has imparted His nature,” for, as the Thessalonican pondered, “what then could be more sacred then this body to which Chirst adheres more closely than by any physical union? Accordingly, we shall hold its high estate in veneration and preserve it when, conscious of so wondrous a splendour, we at all times hold it before the eyes of the soul.” What Father Tom’s gentle dramatics made transparent was nothing less than “the dignity of our nature, and also a clear perception of the loving-kindness of God.” Such a ministry, I should like to suggest, lies at the heart of a pastor’s vocation to proclaim the Gospel in Word and Sacrament.

Lutheran pastors in general, and this future one in particular, have long fallen prey to the tendency towards an over-emphasis on humanity’s helplessness and perpetual struggle with their sinful condition. They do so, I believe, in order to safe-guard that most important of Lutheran emphases, the beauty, power, and passion of grace to love the unloveable, redeem the unredeemable, and resurrect the dead. Too often, we allow Bonhoeffer’s stern critique of cheap grace to move us to lay an emphasis on humanity’s need for the costly grace of the cross, even if such moves serve only to back us into the Forde-ian crater of a life-long passivity masquerading as dependence in the face of sanctification. While scathing meditations on one’s wormhood, so much the staple of the spiritual ruminations of a Johann Gerhard, no longer leap from the pulpit to scare the hell into us, we do have the strange phenomenon of 20th-century Lutheranism’s obsession with the simul, in which we cannot quite stand to let go of our corruption, lest, we fear, we lose the grace we need to cover over those practices that keep us feeling alive and relevant.

What is lost, of course, is that just as true sin is often watered down in the lukewarm tea of pseudo-paradox, so too, a true understanding of the dignity of a Christian is ultimately surrendered. By refusing to bend too low, we also reveal our fear of ascending too high; we fear true worth, lest with it, we incur worthy responsibilities. We speak much of God’s unconditional love for us; thereby, we forfeit the opportunity to participate in the exceedingly delightful pleasure of getting to love God in return. And, as Gerhard reminds us, “no one can have hope of loving God perfectly in the age to come, who does not begin to love God in this present age…Love for God is the chariot of Elijah ascending into heaven. Love for God is the delight of the mind, the paradise of the soul; it shuts out the world, conquers the devil, closes up hell, and opens heaven. Love for God is the seal with which God seals the chosen and the faithful.” As the current state of affairs in the ELCA self-evidently attests, not only has the church failed to shut out the world – she has also, in so doing, neglected to open up the heavens.

Just as Father Tom tantalizingly pulled back the corner of the veil of the Bridegroom’s chamber, so too must we pastors see our entire ministry as one of unfolding for our congregation, and before the watching world, the naked beauty of the human being’s true beauty in the eyes of God. For, as Cabasilas notes, “the thirst of human souls needs, as it were an infinite water,” pointing to the fact that human beings, made in God’s image, contain more desires and mysteries than merely their capacity for atrocity. We are finite creatures who have been ordained to infinite ends, and our the groanings and longings of our bodies and our hearts strain towards the One who has made us for Himself. Yet, such infinite means exceed our finite human capacities. St. Bernard of Clairvaux makes clear that such desires cannot achieve their end, that is, a mind “drunk with divine love,” in that time when God “will cause everything to conform to its Maker and be in harmony with Him,” for, in addition to our sin and the persistent presence of the needs of others, “it is impossible to draw together all that is in you and turn towards the face of God” unless the Lord Himself makes such turning possible. Ministers hear every day the thirsty yearnings of their people, longing to slake the parched throats of their souls with the liquid of the eternal Meribah. But we are poor stewards of this mystery, for we are not given merely to reflect thirst back to the thirsty, but also to offer them the water to drink in which they have already bathed. Too often, we believe ourselves to be beggars, and this is most certainly true. But we are also beggars into whose hands have been pressed alms of infinite value, and the Giver would not have us squander such charity on more rags.

Rather, we pastors can take a cue from Gerhard when he urges us: “let Christ be the target at which your life aims; follow him on the journey, so that you may arrive with him in the heavenly homeland. In all things, let your greatest concern be deep humility and burning love. Let love lift your heart to God so that you may cling to him; let humility hold down your heart lest you grow proud.” We are beggars, but the Bridegroom’s servants have been sent out to invite such as us to the feast, and has given us the means with which to purchase our wedding garment! Or, in plain terms, Christians are not called to remain in the gutter of their sins, for in the Incarnation, death, and resurrection of Christ, and in the sending of His Spirit, God has made a new creation, and won for God’s children a share in Christ’s very nature! It is the privilege and mandate of pastors to act as stewards of the feast in extending as full and as warm an invitation to those who have been invited, not merely restating sinfulness, but also enticing, enthralling, and enchanting those whose imaginations have been so weighed down with the truth of what Christ has done – united Himself with them, and thus, conferred on them a life that grows from stasis to pilgrimage, desires that blossom from selfishness into service, and a beauty that is a sharing in the Beauty of Christ Himself!

Because of Christ’s grace, we can proclaim with Cabasilas that “it is clear that joy in every way corresponds to the abundance of love,” that it is “apparent, then, that human souls have a great and wondrous capacity for love and joy, and that it is perfectly employed only when He is present who is truly loveable as well as beloved.” As both he and Father Tom make clear, it is not only when pastors proclaim the fullness of the theotic dimension of the Gospel, but also enact it by enabling participation in its sacramental-renewing manifestation that this capacity of the human is made a possibility. As Cabasilas notes, “the table, however, is set forth for those who already have been united…it enables us to use the power and the weapons which have been given us and to pursue goodness, no longer as though we were being carried or dragged along, but spontaneously bestirring ourselves and moving as already skilled runners.” Christ does not gift us merely so we can enjoy the pleasures of loving and being loved in God, but also so that such love by use might grow, and thus overflow into invitations to others to come and join the feast. By orienting their preaching, pastoring and presiding towards this positive dimension of the Gospel, ministers and leaders will not only inspire the imaginations and ignite the desires of their people; they also equip and empower them with the means to live more abundant Christian lives, to experience salvation as ever present, and thus to heighten their eschatological anticipation, creating a feedback mechanism of reciprocal grace whereby desire and service mutually amplify one another until, like a hurricane, the entire world is gathered into the rushing winds of the Spirit, which demolishes the flesh, and clears the space upon which God builds the kingdom, in individual hearts, in the community of the church, and upon the face of the creation.


Meditation upon the wonders of the Gospel in its fullness could and ought to consume never-ending pages of delight and exclamation; sadly, these short pages afford me means to have pondered this small slice of the banquet. But in nuce, what I am suggesting is that in reclaiming the positive orientation of the Gospel towards the dignifying deification of human beings who in being joined to Christ are able to transcend narcissistic obsession with God’s love for them in order to join with God in the pleasure of becoming loving agents, pastors are given not only food to sustain their own grace-fired imaginations and scriptural meditations, but also a deeper sense of their call and a greater vocabulary with which to proclaim the Gospel, making their chief aim not merely the care and maintenance of broken sinners, but more radically, the nurturing, encouraging, and empowering of redeemed saints and lovers of God. Contemplation will beget action, and such action will flower forth in new contemplations in the hearts and minds of those who hear the beauty they have been promised incarnated on the tongues and in the hands of the one preaching and presiding at their table. Then worship will begin not only to anticipate, but also to participate, in the feast that is to come.

Lest this all seem to prematurely lift off into the ether of speculation, I recall in closing the point from which we set off in this reflection. Let us go back to that cramped room in a Catholic Worker house, to a withered old Rahnerian priest, reminding the scraps of the world that they are in fact the feast of the Bridegroom, while pleading in his priestly role that God would “take these gifts...make them holy…may they become for us the Body and Blood…” Such gestures, such promises of God, do not merely lead to monastic navel-gazing; they are the words spoken over chaos which transforms it into new creation. To those true beggars whose dignity has never been known, these are truly words that bring new life. The liturgy of the Worker house forms a people who, in Dorothy Day’s words, strive to create “a society in which it is easier to do good.” Believing the Gospel of God’s gift of Godself to the unlovable, believing in the infinite ends to which all strive, the Workers offer hospitality and aide, material gifts meant to help foster the growth of the seed of beauty they know God has planted in the hearts of all God’s children from before the foundation of the world (Eph. 1.4-5). Pastors who practice what they preach seek to live out in and for the body that which they proclaim of and in the Spirit. Even if one is not a Catholic Worker, one can do the same for one’s people, blazing paths of discipleship such that the desires of the heart can become the movements of the body, and the Body can become the movement of the Spirit through the world.

Let us as pastors continue to act as loyal stewards of the mysteries, inviting beggars to be clothed in the wedding garments of the Lamb, supplying them with the wealth of the Bridegroom, and being willing to walk with them as together, we return to the hall of feasting, where eternal desires are given eternal food, in anticipation of the fulfillment of all desire in the world to come. Lord, take us...make us holy...may we become the Body and Blood of Christ. Amen.

(Sources: Bernard of Clairvaux, Selected Works. Trans. G.R.Evans. New York: Paulist Press, 1987.; Nicholas Cabasilas, The Life in Christ. trans. Carmino deCastanzaro. Crestwood: St. Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1974.; Johann Gerhard, Sacred Meditations. Trans. David Yeago (unpublished), 2000.)

Collecting Manna: Johann Georg Hamann

Who? Centuries before "theological aesthetics" became an easy pathway to acceptance in top doctoral programs, the Lutherans were already there, and perhaps one of the great forgotten figures of 18th-century Lutheran philosophy is Johann Georg Hamann. In this lovely excerpt from the third volume of Hans Urs von Balthasar's The Glory of the Lord, the great Roman Catholic theologian recounts an exchange between the Pietist Hamann and his friend, Immanuel Kant, as an illustration of the centrality of the divine kenosis (God's self-emptying condescension - think Philippians 2) to Hamann's understanding of God's relationship to humankind:

If faith is to be possible, offence must always be possible. God has emptied himself so he could write a children's book for us, and Hamann is fascinated by the thought that his friend Professor Kant should be commissioned to write a physics book for children; he gives encouragement and instruction in two magnificent letters: 'To win oneself praise out of the mouths of babes and sucklings! - to share in this ambition is no mean task, and one must not begin by stealing brightly coloured feathers, but by divesting oneself of all superiority in age and wisdom of one's own free will and renouncing all vanity. A philosophical book for children would therefore have to appear as simple, foolish and tasteless as a book written by God for men...the greatest law involved in the method for teaching children therefore consists in condescending to their weakness. However, nobody can understand this practical principle or put it into practice unless, to use a vulgar expression, he is crazy about children and loves them without really knowing why.'

Thus, in the simpleness of childish stammering, the simplicity of God becomes visible and comprehensible, although of course, only for an understanding that through kenosis of itself in the simple act of faith, has itself become a suitable organ for the divine simplicity. (The Glory of the Lord, Vol. III: Studies in Theological Styles: Lay Styles. trans. Louth, Andrew, et al. San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1986, 253.)

A Mass for the Doubters: A Recommendation of Erik Poppe's Troubled Water

I'm very thankful for my librarians here at LTSS. Every time I walk into Lineberger, there is an array of new and fascinating books, films, and musical selections waiting to be discovered and enjoyed, and their recommendations seldom fail to intrigue and delight. I'd like to pass along the favor by commending a film which they led me to, Erik Poppe's Troubled Water. It's, quite frankly, one of the most powerful movies I've ever seen. (And, it's currently available to Watch Instantly on Netflix!)

At first, the movie appears to be a standard redemption story: Jan, convicted for the murder of a four-year old boy, has been released on parole to serve as the organist for a church in downtown Oslo (the film is Norwegeian with English subtitles), a talent he has developed while working with a chaplaincy ministry while incarcerated. His hauntingly beautiful music and gentle demeanor earn him the respect of the church council president, the love of the priest, Anna, and of her four-year old son Jens, who reminds Jan, now going by the name Thomas, of the boy of whose blood he claims he is innocent. One day, leading a tour of the church, the mother of the victim of Thomas' crime recognizes the talented organist, and becomes obsessed with protecting the priest's son from what she believes is imminent disaster. Thomas continues to resolutely state his innocence, while Agnes' (the mother) life continues in a downward spiral in search of closure and resolution.

Part of the film's brilliance is the way in which it skillfully reveals the perspectives and back-stories of both Jan/Thomas and Agnes, exploring the ways in which doubt, woundedness, and the desire for redemption shape their relationships to their loved ones, to themselves, and to one another. While Agnes' husband seeks to move her away to Denmark to give her a new lease on life, Thomas struggles to make sense of what it means to believe that good can indeed come of evil. In a dialogue with Anna, the substance of which I am sure is partly lost in translation, he challenges the priest's conviction that "God has a purpose for everything" by asking "what about evil? Is evil also an act of God? Or maybe you just like to bring in God when all other explanations fail?" Later in the film, Jan will challenge Anna with the same set of questions, forcing the priest to come to grips with the complexity of her self-admitted naive beliefs (if that sounds vague, I simply cannot reveal more! its worth the price of admission, however). The drama of the film revolves around such reversals and recapitulations, not to blur and make ambiguous, but rather, to reveal, to re-imagine, and to re-form our prejudices about theodicy, forgiveness, and grace.

Particularly powerful for me was the film's setting in the midst of the Lutheran monoculture of Norway, where Lutheranism is a state religion and an inexorably interwoven aspect of the general culture. While much of what is said between characters may strike more orthodox ears as undeniably liberal, there is also something to the film's frank and unassuming meditations on the ways in which God and God's grace show up in the midst of the every day and the unexpected. This is not a "Christian" film with a religious agenda - but grace is an undeniable aspect of the backdrop of the world. Baptismal imagery abounds, from Jans' holding the dead four-year old boy in his arms in a raging river, to Agne's therapeutic swimming sessions. And the Eucharist makes an appearance as well. A good candidate for the identity of the film's "bridge" over the troubled waters is the church council president, who despite knowing of Thomas' crime, resolutely tells Agnes that "this is a church. Everyone who comes here gets a second chance...If he can't get a second chance here, where will he?" Rather than accuse Thomas when he discovers his past, the councilman compliments the latter's playing of the St. Thomas Mass, "a mass for doubters," and asks, "have you ever attended communion?" When Thomas shares his disbelief in the sacrament, the councilman replies, "you don't need to believe. It's flesh and blood, bread and wine. It'll work regardless."

As the film unfolds, it becomes apparent that not only in the sacraments, but in the living out of life, of being confronted, acknowledged, unmasked, and finding oneself brought to one's knees, that grace finds us, takes hold of us, and brings us to the depths of the new life offered in the depths of the troubled waters of baptism. Not by offering a bridge, perhaps - but by being with us in the depths into which we plunge when we find the bridge has vanished from beneath our feet. In this sense, the entire film could be described as "a mass for doubters." Regardless, it is a powerful viewing experience. Whether you agree with its theology, "it'll work regardless."

I've included the International trailer for the film below. While it lacks subtitles, it is worth the view for the sample of Thomas' organ playing about two minutes in. Dip in, and if you feel moved, come to the waters to be troubled, to be moved, and to be changed.

Reformation Day Regrets and Lutheran Laments

Being Lutheran means beginning with confession, so here's mine: I didn't attend church on Reformation Day. There was another van of committed (mostly first-year) students who followed the extra-long itinerary home from Luther Bowl to faithfully commemorate the Reformer's grievances with indulgences, but along with the other senior M.Divs with wives, husbands and children waiting at home, decided that I'd pull a Catholic, having taken Eucharist Saturday night, and give myself the morning off. The fact that it was in fact Reformation Sunday didn't occur to me until my post last night. Sorry Marty.

Brazenness is not my intention. Rather, as I reflect, I think my lack of personal enthusiasm participates in a wider, growing sense of weariness and skepticism towards romantic views of our tradition's origins, and their equally romanticized fruits. Family celebrations often serve as necromancers to the skeletons buried in the darkest closets of even the healthiest of communities, dancing them forth into the midst of otherwise joyful festivities. In a late post last night, Russell Saltzman reanimates this choice zombie:

When I was a new pastor in 1980 I recall a much older pastor speaking wistfully of the good old days. That was when a Reformation Day preacher could trash the pope, condemn work’s righteousness, pity those poor guys with their pathetic statues, and then easily move on over to the glory of Luther’s rediscovery of salvation-by-grace-through-faith-in-Christ-apart-from-works-of-the-Law.

We could all go home feeling very good about being Lutheran. When we heard the parable about the Pharisee and tax collector praying in the Temple, well, let’s just say with all the fiery Reformation Day sermons ringing in our ears we were pretty sure who was who in that scheme of things.

While some Lutherans may be smugly jingling their tax collectors' belts, Saltzman keeps us honest:

Nowadays, the pope just isn’t quite the antichrist he once was. Lutherans are in an identity crisis over the whore of Babylon. There are probably a few holdouts among conservative Lutheran churches, but for the rest of us Reformation Day isn’t nearly as much fun as in days gone by

Saltzman concludes his piece, lamenting:

There was a period in recent Lutheran history following Vatican II when, for a small moment, some of us believed Lutherans and Roman Catholics would, could, heal the breach of the sixteenth century. There was a confessional revival of sorts as we scoured our Book of Concord for its Catholic sources. But the moment passed and, I think, will not come again. Some Lutherans opted for Biblicism and others decided to join the big-time Protestant mainline, what is left of it anyway. If there ever is to be another Reformation by Lutherans, returning Lutherans to their catholic if not Catholic roots, likely it must begin elsewhere than among the ruins we have made of Wittenberg.

It feels odd to look back at Reformation Sunday grieving the ever-widening chasm between Wittenberg and Rome. Yet, here I stand. If there was a tragedy inherent in the infamous ELCA Churchwide Assembly of 2009, it was not the move to ordain practicing homosexual disciples of Christ in committed relationships, but that the manner in which this was achieved, at the expense of a clear definition of the holiness expected of all ministers of Christ, fundamentally undercut the slow but steady process of reconciliation that was emerging out of the troubled post-Vatican ecumenical waters. That no compromise is possible along the current lines of construing the dilemma is made evident by the steady crossing of Lutheranism's most prominent theological minds over the Tiber, an exodus that counts among its ranks Richard Neuhaus, Robert Wilkens, Bruce Marshall, and recently, my own teachers Reinhard Huetter and Michael Root. I do not count myself among their ranks, nor intend to unless the Spirit so called me - nor am I remiss in noticing the unmistakably white-male-ness of the band. But it should lead those who continue to celebrate the Reformation" to at least pause, and wonder whether the victory is truly endless, or even, whether it has truly been won.

Yet another curmudgeony old white male, Carl Braaten, describes two possible ways of self-understanding for those of us who remain. Comparing the plight of Lutherans to Cuban ex-pats in the United States, there are some who consider themselves exiles, having been forced to flee their homeland on account of the corrupt Castro regime. These long to return, but await a changing of the guard. Others who fled with them, however, have since grown accustomed to their new home, and have long since become Cuban-Americans. Braaten suggests Lutherans should resist the latter temptation, and should remain "catholics in exile," what Huetter calls "accidental" rather than "essentialist" Protestants. It is as an exile that I take my stand with those who still have hope for the ELCA, however faint its flame may glow.

The Reformation is not about the glorification of the sin of church division, but rather, the on-going effort at achieving the transformation of and reconciliation with those perceived as having once been enemies of the Gospel - (for, it should be noted, while our roots may be in Rome, our leaves may yet bring fresh life and growth to her - nor is she our only possibility!) Has this been achieved? Or are we in danger of becoming the shadow side we've so long stuffed into the long Jungian bag we drag behind us through the history of conflict, conflagration, and broken communion? I fear the latter, but continue to hope and live for the former, even, to modulate R.R. Reno's famous phrase, in the ruins of Wittenberg, where lilies may yet grow.

A Kingdom of Priests: A Reformation Day Reflection

Fresh off my return from Luther Bowl, I am struck how appropriate the event was for this, the weekend of Reformation Day (for all you non-Lutherans out there, we celebrate today the anniversary of Martin Luther's nailing of the 95 theses to the church door in Wittenberg in 1517). This year's was a very UN-Luther Bowl, as only half the schools descended from the German Reformation, while three Presbyterian seminaries seemed to think this was the Calvin Bowl, and Trinity Episcopal managed to hand us our only loss in the tournament. It was a truly Protestant event, short only Anabaptists to make it a full deck of Reformation traditions. Even as we came together as one body to compete together, we yet remained divided and in competition - a sobering reminder that the gifts and prophetic challenges of the 16th century came at the expense of heavy damage to the third article of the Apostle's Creed, "one, holy, catholic and apostolic church."

Its quite fashionable in post-liberal theological circles to scapegoat the Reformation as the source of all of modernity's ills - and often, rightly so. However, blogging for First Things, Peter Leithart reminds us that the many foibles of the movement need not become an excuse to write off the significant blessings it has bestowed on the church as a whole, especially a renewed focus on the biblical truth of the "priesthood of all believers." Leithart laments that the renewal of a sense of the priestly call given each believer in Baptism has led many to abandon the church in favor of private and personal spiritual self-sufficiency, a kind of "get out of church free" card (a perpetual temptation, especially in the new wave of emergent churches who seek to practice a "Sunday-less" Christianity). However, he reminds us that

We are all stationed as guardians of God’s holy house, now identical to the holy people, called to distinguish between holy and unclean and to maintain the purity of God’s household. All believers offer the sacrifice of praise through Jesus, the Bread of God. Every Christian offers the incense of prayer in the holy place of God’s house, and through practices of forbearance and forgiveness we keep God’s house clean. Through using the gifts given by the Spirit, each member of Christ’s body contributes to the edification of the whole.

In the old order, priestly service was housekeeping. In the new order, all are priests, called to the ministry of bodybuilding.

The rest of Leithart's article provides a helpful background into the Biblical contours of the abundant life of serving as Christ's priests, building up the body of Christ, and acting on the truth that “Every Christian is someone else’s priest, and we are all priests to one another.” SDG.

Finn Watch: Luther and Divinization

On Thursday morning, LTSS will host two lights of the "Finnish School of Luther Interpretation," founded and flourishing in the theology department of the University of Helsinki. Dr. Risto Saarinen will lecture on "Gift as the Heart of Lutheran Theology," and Dr. Olli-Pekka Vainio will talk about "Logic and Love of the Gift." It should be a fascinating session from one of the more exciting and creative theological movements in the church today.

Birthed via a series of regional ecumenical dialogues between the Finnish Lutheran Church and the Russian Orthodox, the Finnish Lutheran scholars have challenged the Kantian-Ritschlian foundations of much of 20th-century Luther reconstruction (see my teacher Michael Root's elaboration here), along with its anti-Catholic bias and its focus on forensic justification. In contrast to the latter view, which holds that in Baptism God's righteousness is merely credited or imputed to an individual, the Finns have exhaustively shown in dissertation after dissertation that, at least in the early Luther, we ought more properly focus on a very real "union with Christ," wherein God communicates God's own qualities and nature to the believer. The founder of the school, Tuomo Mannermaa, captures this Lutheran notion of the classic Christian doctrine of theosis, or, divinization, in the title of his treatise, "Christ Present in Faith." God does not merely look upon a broken sinner as righteous, but rather enters into that sinner, indwelling him or her in an intimate union by which that person, in the words of St. Peter, becomes a "partaker in the divine nature" and is subsequently transformed ontologically into a new creation. As Mannermaa summarizes,

The notion of the presence of Christ as favor and gift is the essence of Luther's concept of justification. At least on the level of terminology, the distinction drawn in later Lutheranism between justification as forgiveness and sanctification as divine indwelling is alien to the Reformer. Forgiveness and indwelling of God are inseperable in the person of Christ, who is present in faith In that sense, in Luther's theology, justification and theosis as participation in God are also inseperable. (in Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther. ed. Braaten and Jenson. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998, 38)

When Luther, in On Christian Liberty, speaks of us becoming "Christs to one another," he thus means it quite literally. After the Finns, it becomes difficult to read this work, which Luther himself considered a compendium of his thought, or passages like these, without hearing echoes from the East:

No good work can rely upon the Word of God or live in the soul, for faith alone and the Word of God rule in the soul. Just as the heated iron glows like fire because of the union of fire with it, so the Word imparts its qualities to the soul. It is clear, then, that a Christian has all that he needs in faith...(trans. Lambert, W.A. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2003, 15)

The third incomparable benefit of faith is that it unites the soul with Christ as a bride is united with her bridegroom. By this mystery, as the Apostle teaches, Christ and the soul become one flesh. And if they are one flesh ad there is between them a true marriage...it follows that everything they have they hold in common, he good as well as the evil...(ibid 18-19)

Here Luther merely uses language common to spiritual theologians throughout the history of the church, from St. Augustine, St. Bernard and Nicolas Cabasilas to St. Teresa of Avila and St. John of the Cross.

The Finns' re-visionary account holds great promise for ecumenical theology by positing a Luther engaged in broader catholic debates about ontology, theosis, and participation. In this sense, he belongs less to Protestant partisan politics and polemics, and can speak constructively as a teacher of the church - albeit, a radical, idiosyncratic, and by no means unproblematic pedagogue.

(For those interested in learning more, Carl Braaten and Robert Jenson's collection of lectures by Mannermaa and his circle, Union with Christ: The New Finnish Interpretation of Luther, is highly recommended as an introduction.)