Protestantism's Lost Momentum

The truths of the Reformation remain—but where are the giants of faith?

The 450th celebration of the Reformation is a tribute more to what it was and did than to what it is and is doing today. The Reformation has lost its momentum. Its enduring principles have been abandoned by a vast sector of Protestantism. Even worse, some Protestant leaders would like to move the clock back to pre-Reformation days.

Reformation theology had for its formal and material principles the twofold belief of sola scriptura (the Bible alone) and sola fide (faith alone). In the struggle with Rome, it must be remembered, the Reformers and the Roman Catholics did not dispute the absolute necessity for an authoritative Bible and saving faith. The battle was fought over the question whether Scripture alone and faith alone were sufficient. The Roman Catholics added tradition to Scripture and works to faith. Today, however, the struggle is not over works added to faith and tradition added to Scripture; the question now asked is whether there is any infallible Word, any room for biblical faith—with or without works.

If the Reformation momentum has been lost, so has the momentum of the Roman Catholic Counter-Reformation. Since Vatican II with its aggiornamento, it has been quite clear that the Council of Trent dictum that Scripture and tradition belong together is beginning to lose its hold. And the loss has come not on the side of tradition but on the side of Scripture. At last the “assured results” of higher criticism have penetrated the Roman Catholic Church, and many of its scholars hold views identical to those of their liberal Protestant counterparts. For them as well as for liberal Protestants, the chief problem is, not Scripture alone versus Scripture and tradition, but rather whether there is a fixed, authoritative place for Scripture at all. Pope John XXIII opened the doors of the Vatican palace to winds of change. These winds have been blowing fiercely, so fiercely that his alarmed and beleaguered successor, Pope Paul, is struggling to close the door. Some evangelicals think that aggiornamento indicates in some measure a movement of Roman Catholicism toward Protestantism and feel closer to Rome than to Protestant liberalism. Such optimism is unwarranted. They would do well to listen carefully to the Information Service bulletin (1967/1) of the Roman Catholic Secretariat for Promoting Christian Unity, which says: “Conservative [evangelicals] … believe themselves to have more in common with Catholics than liberal Protestants—especially in view of biblical stress in Vatican II—about which ideas were, however, vague and its conservatism exaggerated.”

It is true that Vatican II reiterated the Council of Trent teaching that “sacred tradition, sacred Scripture, and the teaching authority of the Church … are so linked and joined together that one cannot stand without the others, and that all together and each in its own way under the action of the Holy Spirit contribute effectively to the salvation of souls.” But it is also true that the council opened the door to a depreciation of Scripture by asserting that it teaches “without error that truth which God wanted put into the sacred writings for the sake of our salvation,” leaving plenty of elbow room for “progressive” Roman Catholics to mythologize much of Holy Scripture and remove it from the framework of infallibility. Indeed, Pope Paul has become so alarmed by the advance of theological liberalism in the church that he has publicly expressed his opposition to novel views that subvert teachings of the church long held to be essential. We predict that he may eventually discover that aggiornamento marks the dilution, if not the loss, of the distinctiveness of the Counter-Reformation itself. He will also find that his church has drawn closer to Protestantism than he imagines—but to post-Reformation liberalism rather than to the faith of the Reformers based on sola scriptura and sola fide.

Speaking about post-Reformation Protestantism, President Nathan M. Pusey of Harvard hit the target close to dead center in remarks at Harvard Divinity School:

President Pusey’s observations highlight the loss of Reformation momentum seen both in the rejection of an ultimate source of religious truth and in the lack of faith. Yet another aspect should not be overlooked. Even among some non-conservative theologians there is an ardent appeal for faith—but for a faith divorced from rational or historical foundations. Any preoccupation with faith to the exclusion of the evidences ultimately destroys the notion of biblical faith. The declining influence of the churches bears this out. The increasing ascendancy of humanism that allows no room for the supernatural, creeds, and sola scriptura—all intrinsic to the theology of the Reformers.

Perhaps the plainest sign of the theological loss of Reformation momentum is seen in the grand design of the ecumenical movement and particularly the World Council of Churches. When the World Council was born, evangelical voices loudly proclaimed that its ultimate aim was to bring into being one super-church. With ferocious intensity leading exponents of the WCC denied the charge or claimed that those who promoted the idea of one world church represented only themselves and not the WCC. This strategy was designed to allay the fears of those who believed in unity but opposed the notion of one world church. Now, two decades later, the grand design of the ecumenical movement is exhibited openly. And if that time comes, the Reformation, which has already lost its momentum, will have expired. The full turning of the wheel will have taken Protestantism, lost to Rome in 1517, back to the fold. And Orthodoxy, separated from the See of Peter for a millennium, will have returned to Rome to complete the grand design. No one should be surprised to see the pope of Rome in royal procession followed by Eugene Carson Blake (or his successor) robed in the scarlet of the cardinalate and wearing the biretta on his head.

The Reformation principles are still valid. If they were applied, men would find adequate solutions to many of the problems of our day—moral decline, unprincipled conduct in high office, crippling guilt and mental disorders, poverty, racial tensions, the population explosion. The 450th anniversary of the Reformation need not mark a stage in the passing of an era. By God’s grace it could be a time when the Church recaptures the ageless biblical truths that can still shake men and nations. The Reformation need not be over if Christians today will once again proclaim to all men, and bind their consciences to, the Gospel of Jesus Christ based solidly on sola scriptura and sola fide.

Interest widens in a common witness to biblical concerns

Key Bridge leads from Arlington, Virginia, over the Potomac to historic Georgetown in the nation’s capital. For more than forty evangelical churchmen who met at the Key Bridge Marriott Motor Hotel last month, it also led across denominational barriers toward more effective cooperation for common evangelical goals. Out of the discussions came hopeful endorsement of a proposal for a nationwide cooperative evangelistic campaign to be held in 1973, as well as other valuable suggestions. The churchmen established a ten-member committee to study the feasibility of the 1973 meetings and to begin to coordinate them with other church efforts. Canadian members and other consultants may be added. As presently projected, the campaign would enlist churches in all denominations on a voluntary basis, aiming for a significant demonstration of common concern and a simultaneous impact for evangelism upon the nation.

In some ways the churchmen who gathered at Key Bridge reflected interests already voiced through the widely respected World Congress on Evangelism, held in West Berlin precisely one year ago. But a lot of water has flowed beneath the bridge since then. At Berlin, discussion centered largely on the task and methods of evangelism. In Washington many expressed a degree of impatience with cooperation merely for evangelism—though they are working actively for it—and turned their attention as well to questions of follow-up in the broadest understanding of that term. Evangelism must be an outstanding Christian concern. But could it be, many asked, that in many cases evangelism by conservatives is followed up by liberal-minded churchmen for non-biblical ends? Can evangelicals be missing the boat where youth are concerned, even those within the churches or, more disturbing yet, within the seminaries? What of the vast stream of students in the secular colleges and universities? What about mass-media exposure for evangelical concerns? Are evangelicals speaking as strongly as they might to the great issues of our day, such as sexual immorality, war, anarchy, race, theological confusion and error, church renewal, and ecumenism? That evangelical leaders were raising these questions was a very encouraging sign.

Also encouraging was the attention given to suggestions for areas of evangelical cooperation in coming years. Among these were:

• Local fellowship of biblically minded clergy with a view to common evangelical witness and action.

• Enlistment of the laity in larger fulfillment of the demands of Christian discipleship and vocation.

• A special witness for biblical perspectives to the laity and to theological students, perhaps through a seminary-level Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship.

• A selective theological journal or monograph series on key issues, and perhaps a comprehensive evangelical book program.

• A probing of mass media visibility for evangelical concerns, perhaps in a conference shaped by Evangelical Press Association.

• A consultation to consider effective evangelical confrontation of secular ideas and ideals in the realm of education and learning.

The 1966 World Congress on Evangelism defined evangelism as “the proclamation of the Gospel of the crucified and risen Christ, the only Redeemer of men, according to the Scriptures, with the purpose of persuading condemned and lost sinners to put their trust in God by receiving and accepting Christ as Saviour through the power of the Holy Spirit, and to serve Christ as Lord in every calling of life and in the fellowship of his Church, looking forward toward the day of his coming in glory.” Berlin gave great impetus to the first part of that demand—the task of persuading sinners to put their trust in God by receiving Christ as Saviour—and the consultation at Key Bridge furthered it. Fortunately, the Washington conference also began to look seriously at the second obligation in that statement: encouraging those who have accepted Christ as Saviour to serve him as Lord in every aspect of their lives.

As evangelicals give attention to this obligation—with all its implications for such matters as theological and intellectual leadership, impact through mass communications, and intensified efforts in social service—the Key Bridge conference will increasingly be seen as a significant moment in the evangelical advance.

Fifty years ago a small force of Bolshevik revolutionaries led by Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Leon Trotsky shook the world. With lightning swiftness they staged a ruthless coup d’ état that overthrew the democratic Russian provisional government of Alexander Kerensky and ushered in the present Communist era. On November 7 Communists around the world will celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the revolution with extravagant displays of Soviet propaganda and renewed pledges to communize mankind. The Communists’ undeniable advances—territorial, economic, military, and scientific—and continuing efforts to subvert and control all nations should lead free men everywhere to mark the anniversary by taking a fresh and clear-sighted look at the increasingly sophisticated Communist strategies.

In the realm of religion, the latest ploy is Christian-Marxist dialogue. This dialogue, which is being promoted by Communist intellectuals and Protestant and Roman Catholic secular theologians, deserves particular scrutiny. It has already gained momentum in Europe. At a recent five-day Christian-Marxist conference sponsored by the Czech National Academy of Scientists at Marienbad, a participant commented: “A line dividing conservatives from progressive views cuts right through both the Christian and Marxist ideologies. Marxists and Christians who hold humanistic views can … agree on many things.”

Speeches by French Communist theoretician Roger Garaudy calling for dialogue with Christians, delivered at leading American universities and seminaries last December, were greeted enthusiastically by such theologians as Paul Lehmann, Harvey Cox, Paul Van Buren, Leslie Dewart, Roger Shinn, and Thomas Dean. Writing in the Union Seminary Quarterly Review, Temple University’s Professor Dean claimed that “Christian-Marxist dialogue represents the theology of the future.” Similar sentiments were expressed by British seminarians and Young Communist League members at a conference in Wetherby, England, this month. Another boost for Christian-Marxist discussions came with the announcement by Director Paul Albrecht that the World Council of Churches’ Department of Church and Society will sponsor such a meeting in 1968. WCC sponsorship of Christian-Marxist dialogue is hardly unexpected in view of the 1966 WCC Geneva Conference, where discussions and documents simply assumed, said Harvey Cox in Commonweal, “that while Communist and liberal states provide markedly different contexts for Christian service and witness, neither is to be rejected completely out of hand as a possible way of organizing state and economic power.”

Communists seek serious dialogue because they recognize the essentially humanistic basis of contemporary theology. Since many secular theologians have abandoned belief in a transcendent, personal God who has acted supernaturally in history and revealed himself objectively in his incarnate Son and in sacred Scripture, and instead embrace an ambiguous theism known only subjectively through involvement in the secular affairs of life, the Marxists have good reason to believe they can gradually move such men into their orbit. The secularist theologians desire dialogue because their man-centered orientation leads them to a program of direct action to change society. Although most secularists believe Marx erred in many ways, they credit him for his teaching on the dialectical nature of human history and applaud his insistence that man grasp the historical initiative to master his world. These theologians deplore “the strident anticommunism of the churches” (Cox), recognize “the common humanistic concern of both Christianity and Marxism” (Dewart), and admire Marx for exposing “a great error in the Christian’s understanding”: God’s immutability in relation to man and history (Lehmann).

The dialogue between Garaudy’s revisionistic, demythologized, dedogmatized Marxism and the secularist theologians’ existential, demythologized, dedogmatized Christianity rests on a common rejection of the traditional understanding of transcendence and a common acceptance of subjectivity as the basis for knowledge and action. Communist Garaudy emphasizes that transcendence is not a supernatural force but rather the ability of evolving man forever to progress. Firm in his atheistic belief that it is men who have created gods, he is pleased that secularist theologians have laid aside “archaic” conceptions of God, original sin, and the life to come and now stress “a deeper immersion in existence” and the value of human effort to transform the world. Lehmann essentially accepts Garaudy’s idea of transcendence but argues that man’s power of “initiative and creation” is the power of love given by God. Cox claims that Christians must learn from the Marxists that all human thought, including theological thought, is shaped by a concrete historical situation. Eventually, he asserts, the participants in the Christian-Marxist dialogue will have to join together to confront the problems of a world that needs to be changed.

Although Marxist revisionist Garaudy and existential secular theologians differ in certain views, they find themselves together in their humanistic orientation and their emphasis on the need for revolutionary political action. Garaudy’s doctrine does not represent the hardline Marxism of the Communist party in Moscow; yet secularists look upon it as evidence that a rapprochement between the Communist world and the free world is becoming increasingly possible. In their naïve optimism, they seem blind to the actual attitude and policy of Soviet Communism toward religion. They fail to recognize that the dialogue is a carefully calculated strategy to further Communist influence in the world.

The actual attitude of the Soviet state toward religion is analyzed in a doctoral dissertation completed this month by Benjamin L. Armstrong at New York University. Applying the method of content analysis to official Russian periodicals, 1959 through 1965, Armstrong found the attitude of the Soviet government toward religion “highly unfavorable.” Religious groups ranked this way in degree of disfavor: sectarians (independent groups of believers), Jews, Orthodox, Baptists, Roman Catholics, and Muslims. Hostility was inversely proportional to size; smaller groups encountered greater opposition. Armstrong suggests that the reasons for strong disfavor of “sectarians” were (1) their person-to-person proselytizing, (2) their lack of central authority to control members, (3) their independent, semi-illegal, semi-clandestine activities, and (4) their anti-society stance. Groups that cooperated in the peace movement, the ecumenical movement, and other projects, that maintained a close relation with the government, that did not evangelize, and that had no ties with international powers in disfavor with Soviet policy-makers received less severe treatment. Armstrong states: “The governmental attitude toward the rank-and-file believer was a consistent insinuation that self-respecting persons would not degrade themselves to become actively related to a religion.”

Christians must not be deceived by new attempts at Christian-Marxist dialogue. Communists remain wholly dedicated to atheism and the fallacious social doctrines of Marx. There is no hope of eventual agreement in the dialogue unless Christians scuttle the revealed truth of Scripture. Secular theologians who have substituted anthropological, subjective theology for theocentric biblical doctrine will one day discover they have been “had” in the dialogue or, if they are honest, will realize their position is no longer Christian.

The fiftieth anniversary of the Bolshevik revolution should remind free men of the necessity to continue their vigilant opposition to Communism in all its manifestations. We should never forget Svetlana Alliluyeva’s recently published words about the accomplishments of the revolutionaries who tried to do good by doing evil: “Millions were sacrificed senselessly, thousands of talented lives extinguished prematurely. The tale of these losses could not be told in twenty books, never mind twenty letters.” The false religion of Communism can be refuted and ultimately defeated only as Christians confront Marxists directly with the Gospel.

Without equivocation Christians must assert that God, not nature, is ultimate; that man’s problem lies in his sin against his creator, not in domination by capitalistic economic forces; that the value of the individual, not the state, is supreme; that Jesus Christ, God incarnate, offers hope not only for this life but also for the life to come; that truth can be known in the living and written Word of God through the power of the Holy Spirit, not by mere involvement in the conflicts of life; that God’s laws, not expediency, must govern the conduct of men and nations; that history will be consummated and peace achieved in the establishment of God’s Kingdom when Christ returns to judge mankind and assume his kingship, not in the emergence of a classless society. Christians must never waver nor compromise in proclaiming this message, for only the Gospel of Christ is able to meet the needs and challenges of Marxists and all other men.

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