Catholicity in the New World

Status
Not open for further replies.

Scott

Puritan Board Graduate
I read chapter 1 of a dissertation by Peter Wallace. The chapter concerns CATHOLICITY AND CONSCIENCE: THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF 1837. I found it quite interesting. Has anyone read this?

I appreciated his comparisons of the models of catholicity in the Old World and New World. The Old World (Europe) saw catholicty as something inhering in the visible church and was expressed by having one established church per region. To varying degrees other sects could "dissent" from the established church and the established church could "tolerate" the dissenters. Many wrote against toleration. Anyway, dissent and toleration makes sense only in the context of an established, official church.

In the New World, this concept did not last very long, as there was no federal established church and state established churches did not have much longevity. The reason is in part to the immigrant nature of the country's churches. People from the Old World would come over and found their churches here. Churches tended to have a national flavor to them, with Scots being presbyterian, Germans being Lutheran or German reformed, and the like. Of course, congregationalism was popular too.

Anyway, this forced new models of catholicity among denominations and congregations. There were strong fights in terms of catholicity between Old School and New School presbyterians. Old School understood catholicity as something that existed in visible church organizations, and expressed itself in cordial relations with other denominations. New School presbyterians (who, putting aside ecclesiology, were arguably pelagian heretics BTW) argued for catholicity as something that inhered among individual Christians, not institutions or denominations.

Anyway, the history was very interesting, and I commend it to others. I have not read the other chapters. Does anyone else who has read it have any comments?

Scott
 
I wonder if in hindsight now we can evaluate the consequences of each model being applied?

In the Old World, with established churches and limited toleration of dissenters, orthodox Christianity has for all practical purposes disappeared. While in the New World, with all the warts that came with an over emphasis on the individual and tolerance, orthodox Christianity still to some degree flourishes.
 
Adam: I have thought about this too. Although, they did have a nearly 2000 year stretch, compared to our few hundred, although there were obviously very corrupt and dark times included in that stretch.
 
I've read the whole thing and referred to it several times in a class on the History of American Presbyterianism. He really documents the changing idea of catholicity and it really gets interesting with the Old School trying unsuccessfully to hold the old line.

see the chapter on education.
http://www.peterwallace.org/dissertation/5education.htm

where he talks about how unsuccessful the effort(Presbyterian church schools) was and why.

[Edited on 8-26-2005 by rmwilliamsjr]
 
Richard: I think I got the reference from you awhile back. As I recall, you were looking for other treatments of catholicity. The PCA has this article from Samuel Miller up that might interest you, Church Attachment and Sectarianism. Also, you might check out John Frame's Evangelical Reunion. The entire book is available online at Third Millennium. When you get the the page, use your browser to find "evangelical reunion."

Scott
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top