wfn.org | Church colloquy debates power of 'words' in the Word

["Barb Powell"<powellb@ucc.org>]

July 28, 1998
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United Church of Christ
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Church colloquy debates the power of 'words' in the Word

     CRAIGVILLE, Mass. --  Protestants love to talk.  So it's
not surprising that the 15th annual Craigville Colloquy July 13-17
drew more than 60 theologians, church historians, pastors and
laypeople to this small Christian resort on Cape Cod to talk . . .
about talk.
     But for a tradition that draws its authority from the Word,
language is a serious business.  Christians always get into trouble
when they disagree about the meaning of words.  What does God
really say in the Bible?  Can the Bible's meaning be transferred
without alteration from one century to the next?  How can the
language we use be faithful to the mind of God?
     This year's colloquy was a broadly ecumenical event,
drawing theologians not only from the 1.4-million-member United
Church of Christ but also from the American Baptist Churches,
Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Episcopal Church,
Presbyterian Church (USA), Evangelical Lutheran Church in
America, Evangelical Covenant Church and the Unitarian
Universalist Association.
     Although most of the papers dug deeply into the
disciplines of hermeneutics, linguistics and communication theory,
several vexing problems lay in the background.  Mainline churches
are still struggling with conflicts that point to an uneasy relationship
with the words of Scripture and tradition.  The substitution of
inclusive language for traditional words about God, the painful
debate over recognition of same-sex relationships, the
"communication gap" between the church and a post-Christian
culture all revolve around the colloquy theme, "Faithful and
Powerful Language in Preaching, Praying and Liturgy."
     The opening paper by church historian Christopher L.
Chase tracked the shift in language theory from the "standard
social science model," which argued that language is a "cultural
invention" and therefore under human control, to the view of MIT
linguists that language is "innate" and therefore prior to culture. 
"Language is neither intentionally constructed nor produced by the
community that uses it; it is simply 'realized' there," Chase said. 
     So "faithful language is language that is faithfully situated
within a web of meanings
established by a tradition of usage," he said.  The church's
"linguistic code" is not "the product of the community's
experience, but exists arbitrarily and prior to it."  This means that
"the words and metaphors which articulate the Christian faith do
not originate in experience but rather meet us there." 
     Language is therefore experienced as "given," not "made." 
Because language is not
culturally determined, religious words can travel from one culture
to another and do not
necessarily have to be "translated" into another linguistic code.
"Cultural grammars . . . have
blurred edges . . . because all are rooted in the common behavior
of humankind," Chase said.
     This means that universal claims can be associated with the
words of religious tradition, but Chase went one step further:  The
word itself is the right word for the universal meaning, and
therefore cannot be substituted for another word. 
     Proposals for inclusive language frequently substitute
words like "Creator" for "Father" or mix feminine and masculine
metaphors in the same hymn or text.  These substitutions disrupt
the tradition's "web of meanings," Chase said.  Even though
cultures may change, the language expresses deep meanings of
faith and must not change.
     "Fresh metaphors and images" can be added to Christian
discourse, but not as substitutes for the older images, he said. 
"Such terms must stand in apposition to the core words and
metaphors instead of replacing them.  Since metaphors, like
words, can never be truly synonymous, interchangeability is not
possible if religious talk is to be both honest and faithful." 
     In her paper, UCC theologian Elsabeth Hilke said she had
been convinced many years ago by her reading of Karl Barth that
"the attempt to separate out the truth of the Christian faith from the
language of Scripture . . . is not only arrogant; it is fundamentally
impossible. The canon of Scripture is the regula fidei, the norm of
faith."
     But this leads us to the problem of language.  The truth of 
Scripture cannot be transmitted "simply by repeating" Bible texts. 
"The truth of God's Word in the Bible . . . can never be simply
identified with the human words of the Bible. Rather, the Word of
God comes to the faithful in the Bible in an event, an event in
which they 'hear' God's Word addressing them and respond in
obedience and decision."
     So the Word of God is never a truth that is at the disposal
of the theologian's "procedures of examination and analysis."  Nor
can we set it aside to analyze and verify some other day.  "Rather,
those to whom the Word of God is spoken know it to be
addressed to them particularly. They confess that it is aimed at
them in their particular circumstance.  Furthermore, when the
Word of God comes to a person in the Bible, it is never a Word
before which the recipient feels he/she may remain neutral.  He/she
is not free to decide whether or not to respond to it.  The faithful
know it only as a Word which is addressed to them, demanding
immediate response -- obedience and decision." 
     The words of Scripture therefore become God's Word
"when the history that they record is understood, not as a flat
statement of affairs or a report," but as a "speech-action" in which
God creates obedience in the one who listens to the Word.
     The paper by Jürgen Hilke, a sociologist and pastor in the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, drew from the work of
German critical theorist Jürgen Habermas to make a case for the
"conciliar" use of language in which all participants have equal
rights.  Hilke contrasted Habermas with "rational choice theorists"
who believe that action and speech are merely "the intentional and
self-interested behavior of individuals in an objectified world, i.e.,
one in which objects and other individuals can possibly be
manipulated in relation to one another."  So "the rationality of
action is correspondingly conceptualized as the efficient linking of
actions (here understood as means) to the attainment of individual
goals."
     But according to Habermas, communication is not
oriented towards manipulation but
"reaching an understanding."  "Within this model," Hilke said,
"actors are conceived of as seeking an understanding in regard to
some practical situation confronting them in order to coordinate
their actions consensually."
     Communication requires that meaning is determined not by
power relationships but by partners who have an "equal chance"
to contribute to the conversation.  Otherwise, the result would not
be a "rationally motivated consensus" but only a "compromise or
an agreement of convenience."  In the church, this means
communication has to be "conciliar."  But communication in the
church is not only spatial but temporal, not only with
communication partners in the "visible church" but also with the
invisible communion of saints of the past and future, in other
words, with the Bible and tradition.  So how does Habermas'
model work when many of the participants are speaking from the
distant past?
     For Habermas, the "communication community" spans
time and geography, Hilke said.  Thus, there is a "horizon toward
which all communicative action is oriented."  Although Habermas
is not a Christian, Hilke is "intrigued" by a model of
communication between Christians that is both "historical and
eschatological," oriented towards the past and the future, in a
"conciliar church" in which the saints of the past, present and
future are sitting around the same table.
     "Habermas says that within this communication community
the hermeneutical endeavor of reaching back across the centuries
to some ancient text and author . . . could theoretically be
reconstructed as a learning process on the part of the ancient
author."  Does that mean that St. Paul, for example, can learn as
much from us as we can from him?  "Is this an expression of
supreme arrogance," Hilke asked, or a necessary condition of
communication between the past and the present?  If the tradition
is "closed" to everything the church in later ages might say in
response to its claims, then is true communication between Paul
and the church possible?
     In small groups, the participants struggled with these
themes.  Some felt that the language of culture and personal
experience is a valid starting point for "faithful language."  The
words of Scripture and tradition, therefore, are only one language
among many.  Others agreed with Chase that the tradition meets
personal experience but is not controlled by it.  So one small
group said that "communication must begin with the common,
contextual language of human experience, found in dialogue within
our congregations and with the people we would include in our
congregations," while another argued that "the relationship of the
worshiping community to the scriptural text, braided together by
the Holy Spirit like strands in a rope, provides the foundation for
faithful and powerful language."
     The "intention" of preaching is what matters most, UCC
pastor Henry Yordon of
Norwalk (Conn.) Congregational Church said in his address to the
colloquy.  "To what extent relate to the culture?  Relate,
howsoever to deliver the Gospel!"  But the real intention of
preaching is God's intention that the saving Gospel of Jesus Christ
is proclaimed and heard.
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