Just as you, Father, are in me and I am in you, may they also be one in us, so that the world may believe that you sent me. (ISV)

Some of the Church’s I’ve been apart of were possible open to the accusation of acting like a religious service industry; the equivalent to a spiritual Wal-Mart in which people are conceived of as religious consumers? A worldly lure for success mixed with a heavy dose of the sort of Neo-Tribalism spoken of here can easily enough find its way into a strategic ministry plan. This is perhaps true when niche programming is used in ways which do not merely recognize our differences but reinforces our separateness.

A corollary to such Neo-Tribalism can be seen when we tell “the teens” to do their thing over there while telling “the college students” to do their thing somewhere else and the “young families” have their programs while the “Senior Citizens” have their own activities. Can it be anything other than sheer irony when local congregations profess that there is “one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church” and have an everyday reality fragmented into various interest groups?

For us there is one God, the Father . . .

I definitely concur. We must always remember that “like” implies “unlike”.

No you did not base anything in what you have written so far on eternal subordinationism (or anything close). Nor am I charging you with anything of the like friend. I’m simply saying we cannot push viewing relationships between humans and the Godhead too far (or we might fall dangerously close to mistakes such as the ones Giles and many others points out).

However, Mr. Aguirre’s right that these sorts of inferences need to find independent support, or at least dependent patterns of support, throughout the rest of Scripture and through salvation history. That’s just a good hermeneutical requirement. But inasmuch as “God wills the Church because He wills unity,” as JPII said, and since He wills unity for us because it isn’t good for us to live “in isolation” but rather “in communion” — just as God Himself has eternally subsisted — it seems we have warrant to pursue these connections, just as St Paul pursues the analogy between marriage (“one flesh” covenantally) to teach us something about the Church’s relation to Christ (and marriage).

I did not base anything I wrote on the subordination of the Eternal Son. I confess that was not even in my thinking. I based what I wrote on reflections about God and the call to communion, most particularly, the call of God that we share in the divine life of the Trinity. In reference to what you said,”human-socio-relationships should not be based on inferences from the Trinitarian Godhead”; St. Paul seems to make inferences on the Church and its unity and diversity by appealing to the Trinity (1st Cor 12).

A woman is to be subject to her husband based on the clear command from Scripture, not from fancy inference from Trinitarian relationships.

It is one thing to say that we can contemplate on the relationships within the Blessed Trinity, relationships which are clearly seen in Scripture as well as Trinitarian ideas such as Tertullian’s so-called economic manifestation of the Trinity in redemptive history. It is quite another thing to codify doctrinal positions among human beings based on the analogy within the Godhead. This is what I believe the Catholic Catechism and the entire thesis of Giles work is getting at. At best we can draw important insights to be sure, at worst we formulate entire doctrines based on these inferences.

In Giles work (coming from an Anglican perspectives) he exposes just this fallacy in the writings of many modern theologians such as; George Knight III, Wayne Grudem, Bruce Ware, Norman Geisler, John Frame and Robert Letham (are just a few examples). The rational is, “Because the Son is eternally subordinated to the Father in like manner a woman is to be subordinated to her husband.” Not so argues Giles and he marshals in support a host of patristic fathers (some Protestant voices such as Calvin and Barth) as well as insights on this issue from Edmund Fortman, Karl Rahner and Yves Conger to show that not only is the Son not eternally / ontologically subordinate to the Father but that doctrines surrounding human-socio-relationships should not be based on inferences from the Trinitarian Godhead.

Quite poignant is Giles admission, “I have not found a Roman Catholic theologian who gives any support to the idea that the Son is eternally subordinate in any way.” (p. 169). This is after he pulls the rug under Anglican / Reformed / Evangelical, erroneous readings.

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R. E. Aguirre
Regulafide.blogspot.com

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R. E. Aguirre
Regulafide.blogspot.com

I think it’s good to be weary, good to be cautious about these matters. Of especial importance is seeing to it that the starting points are right and that the implications or analogical inferences are going in the right direction. Thus the Catechism warns us that, though God is indeed Father, we can’t begin with our own experiences of our parents, etc., and then take those experiences to determine the content of ‘Father’ as it is applied to God. The Catechism’s clear that this would be idolatrous. On the other hand, if we’re beginning with a proper dogmatic understanding of the Trinity and considering the nature of humans created in the imago dei, there are bound to be important insights concerning who we are and what God ultimately made us for. If I’m reading Tom R. right, I think that’s what he’s got in mind. (That right, Tom?)