One often runs into things like this on the Interwebs:
The myth that we have to choose between orthodoxy and orthopraxy is a very popular schism in the mental life of the Church. And I get what this meme is trying to say: that Correct Opinions about Jesus are worthless if not accompanied by obedience to Jesus. After all, Jesus himself warns the emptily pious:
“Not every one who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you evildoers.’ (Mt 7:21–23)
And indeed, the spectacle of loveless Christian inquisitors, filled with Correct Theology and mercilessly committed to the destruction of the least of these and the adoration of a man like Donald Trump for years has been a sobering reminder of why faith without works of love is dead.
But exalting orthodoxy above orthopraxy is not healed by pitting orthopraxy against orthodoxy. They are not enemies and are intended to reinforce each other. The thing that goes unnoticed about the passage from Jesus above is that it, like so much of the Sermon on the Mount, is a huge demand for his hearers to grasp the fact that the implications of his words in the Sermon point directly to what the Church will eventually have to work out in the Creed. Again and again, Jesus implicitly and explicitly makes claims to be nothing less than the God of Israel. That is why he not only takes for granted the right to be addressed as “Lord, Lord” but to call God his Father and to act as the Judge of the entire world. It is why he declares in the Sermon that he came to fulfill the Law (Matthew 5:17). And it is why he repeatedly assumes the divine perogative to edit, augment, and expand on the Law of Moses with the repeated formula, “You have heard that it was said… but I say to you.”
The question such preaching is designed to provoke, the question that would ultimately be demanded of him at his trial before Caiaphas, is “Who in the world do you think you are?” The whole Sermon is the riddle. The Creed is the eventual answer the Church arrives at. And neither makes sense without the other. When Caiaphas, prompted by such shocking talk from Jesus, asks, “Are you the Christ, the Son of the Blessed?” Jesus’ reply is “I AM”: the name of the living God from Exodus 3:14 (Mark 14:61-62). And ultimately that is the only reason for obeying Jesus’ teaching in the Sermon.
Pitting the Sermon against the Creed or vice versa is like asking which blade on the scissors does the cutting or demanding to know if a zebra is white with black stripes or black with white stripes. The silly demand that we choose between belief in Christ and obedience to Christ is a nonsensical schism. Faith in Christ is the only thing that makes it possible to obey Christ and obedience to Christ is the only way to incarnate living faith in Christ. The Creed is not attempting to replace the Sermon on the Mount. And the Sermon on the Mount is packed with implications about what Christ demands we believe about who he is: the incarnate Son of God. The last thing the Church needs is yet another demand that we choose between things that are in no way opposed. Stop the false dichotomies!
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One Response
Right.
Why is the biggest word there is. The Creed answers the question “Why should I?” Had a small chat about this with a man a couple days ago. Without the Creed(s) the Catholic Religion is reduced to a fantastic myth and an ethical framework not demonstrably better than Kant’s or Nietzsche’s.