wfn.org | In praise of a holy heretic: A tribute to Robert McAfee Brown

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Note #6858 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

(1920-2000)
21-September-2001
01340

In praise of a holy heretic

A tribute to Robert McAfee Brown (1920-2000)

by Edward McGlynn Gaffney, Jr. 

VALPARAISO, Ind. - When I first heard the news of the death of Robert McAfee
Brown, I flashed back to my first encounter with him as a young Catholic
seminarian in 1962.

	A few of my classmates and I biked over to Stanford from St. Patrick's
Seminary in Menlo Park (Calif.) to meet the distinguished professor who had
just left Union Theological Seminary in New York. What we found that
afternoon was an earnest, lucid, and witty person eager to break theology
out of seminary confinement.

	In January of 1963 we did something now commonplace but then regarded as
shockingly new: we gathered in Bob's office to pray for one another during
the Week of Prayer for Christian unity. These meetings began a life-long
friendship with one of America's finest minds and sweetest souls.

	That summer I left California to study theology in Rome. The Second Vatican
Council was in session each fall, and I served as a translator for the
guests of the Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, known as
"observers." Bob Brown was one of them.

	Observers were not given formal voice at the Council, but Brown found an
effective way around that rule, making his views on the draft documents
known to many bishops and to their theological consultants in a very
effective way. He showed great respect for the church that had invited him
into the inner circle of their highest level deliberations. If Presbyterians
ever thought of establishing an embassy in the Vatican (just kidding!),
Brown would have been the best one to fill the position.

	But Brown also approached his task as an opportunity given him by the Holy
Spirit to speak with clarity about truths that had not yet become common
ground with Catholics. If Presbyterians ever thought of establishing a
preaching mission to the Vatican (I'm serious; think about it!), Brown again
would have been your man in Rome. He was fearless and bold in articulating
his convictions.

	More than four decades ago Brown broke fresh ground by appearing in print
with a Jesuit, Gustave Weigel, as co?author of An American Dialogue: A
Protestant Looks at Catholicism and a Catholic Looks at Protestantism. Brown
was more generous about Catholics than Weigel was about Protestants. But
both of these two bold pioneers taught a generation of American ecumenists
how to listen carefully to one another without pointing bony fingers of
accusation at the other and without stopping our ears when the conversation
became unfamiliar or uneasy.

	Brown invented the term "secular ecumenism," by which he meant not that
religious convictions should be dumbed down to the lowest common denominator
of thin consensus, but that God sets the agenda for the churches by calling
them to pay attention to what is happening in the world around them.

	Especially the Third Word, for which he became a passionate advocate.
Against the large issues of world -- hunger, global warming, and violence of
all sorts -- the disunity of quibbling Christians is disclosed for what it
is: a true scandal or stumbling block that impedes faith.

	Bob Brown was prolific. But it wasn't the number of books he wrote that is
so impressive. It was his refreshing candor and graceful style.  I never met
a Bob Brown book I didn't like.

	Despising theological gobbledygook and rarified nonsense, he established
his mark as a superb translator of profound religious truths into elegant,
yet accessible plain English. Like the word of God to which he gave his
ultimate allegiance, Brown's word was a two?edged sword piercing through the
defenses of his readers and challenging us to generous and costly
discipleship.

	Presbyterians might rightly claim Robert McAfee Brown as one of the most
thoughtful and gifted writers of the church  in this century. I give you
that, but he was much more. A witness against a senseless war, who raised up
his voice in concert with leaders of other faiths, such as Abraham Joshua
Heschel and Michael Novak. A Christian so deeply in tune with his Jewishness
that only he could testify as movingly as he did to the testimony of Elie
Wiesel about the terror of the Shoah.

	But most of all I remember Bob Brown as St. Hereticus, the nom de plume he
adopted for his witty and wise columns that spoofed churchy stuffiness so
relentlessly. God must be smiling more broadly or laughing much harder now
that she has such a funny partner to dialogue with forever.

(Edward McGlynn Gaffney, Jr. is a professor of law at Valparaiso University.
With Judge John T. Noonan, Jr., he is the co-author of Religious Freedom
(Foundation Press, 2001), and he has written several amicus curiae briefs on
behalf of the PC(USA) Stated Clerk in cases dealing with religious freedom.)

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