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On the dynamic relation between ecclesiology and congregational studies.

Article Excerpt
ECCLESIOLOGY IS PRESENTLY RESPONDING to two sources of pressure from opposite directions. On the one hand, a more exact knowledge of the historical origins of the church and the variety of forms the church has assumed across its historical life challenge the idea of a normative ecclesiology. On the other hand, emergent churches in all parts of the world, particularly in Africa and Asia, sometimes appear to stand at the margins of being identifiably Christian. These two concerns intersect in the study of some congregations where broad doctrinal claims about the church are being tested by a realistic scrutiny of the concrete political and social dynamisms driving particular churches and the practices of actual congregations. Part of the liveliness of the discipline of ecclesiology today stems from an interaction between the desire to preserve the essential character of the church and the need that it adapt to new historical situations, between a normative concept of the church and the need that it become inculturated in the life of its members.

The foci of these two pressure points are addressed by two distinct subdisciplines of ecclesiology, the one pursuing a normative concept of the church, the other studying its historical manifestations, most concretely in congregational studies. Taking up these lines of force, this article develops a response to the following questions: How does formal academic ecclesiology relate to congregational studies, and vice versa? The article contains two parts. The first assumes the point of view of academic ecclesiology, and from that perspective theorizes on the relationship between these two ecclesiological subdisciplines. The second assumes the perspective of the discipline of congregational studies and reflects on how that field of study bears on the more general understanding of the church as such. The two probes into this relationship yield remarkably similar conclusions concerning the mutual relevance and influence that each discipline should have on the other in advancing a more holistic understanding of church.

PART 1

FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF GENERAL ECCLESIOLOGY

We begin this analysis of the relationship between general or formal ecclesiology and congregational studies from the broader vantage point of the former as distinct from the particular focus of congregational studies. (2) This part is divided into three sections. The first establishes further the methodological presuppositions from which these ecclesiological reflections arise. From that basis it formulates an understanding of the relationship between general ecclesiology and congregational studies in four theses. The third section will then test those theses by entering into dialogue with an earlier writing of James Nieman on congregational studies and ecclesiology on the specific topic of the marks of the church.

Ecclesiology from Below

This first foray into ecclesiological language, especially regarding presuppositions and method, is designed to lay out some of the presuppositions and principles in the study of the church that govern part 1 of this article. Ecclesiological method and language are far from standardized. Thus we begin by mapping the field on which this particular game will be played. This may be accomplished by a contrast between ecclesiology from above and from below and a consideration of some of the consequences that flow from a method that proceeds from below.

The phrases "from above" and "from below" in ecclesiology operate by analogy with their use in Christology. The key word in both terms is "from"; the phrases designate a point of departure and a method, not content. Christology from above begins the process of understanding the person Jesus Christ with statements of authority that name the confessional beliefs of Christians about Jesus Christ; these may be drawn from Scripture or from the classical doctrines about Christ; they are metaphysical in character. By contrast, Christology from below begins the formal process of understanding and explaining who Jesus Christ is by first focusing on the appearance of Jesus of Nazareth in history and the religious experience of him that lead to the doctrinal interpretations. Christology from below begins with history and traces the genesis and development of christological belief. Although the point of departure of this Christology is historical, it concludes with equally confessional interpretations of Jesus and hermeneutical appropriations of them. The result is critical affirmation of Jesus as the Christ in whom is found God's salvation.

The contrast in ecclesiology is analogous. In ecclesiology from above, understanding the church begins with and is based upon the authority of Scripture or classical doctrines. It usually presupposes a specific church. Its nature and qualities are characterized by biblical metaphors--"the body of Christ" is a good example. The origin of the church is construed in doctrinal terms with Jesus Christ as the founder, so that the ministries and corresponding structure of the church correlate with God's will. By contrast, ecclesiology from below begins historically with a historical account of the genesis of the church beginning with the ministry of Jesus. In a critical historical account, Jesus' role in the origin of the church is shifted from being founder to being the foundation of a church that comes into being later in the first century in the memory of Jesus and under the influence of the Spirit. Ecclesiology from below traces the gradual formation of the church during the first century, using historical and sociological categories and also recognizing the early church's experience and testimony to the power of God in the whole movement, that is, its theological dimension. In contrast to the tendency of ecclesiology from above, ecclesiology from below notices the pluralism of church polities during the course of the church's formation.

Much more should be said about the qualities of these two types of ecclesiology, but the point here is simply to stipulate that this whole essay unfolds within the framework of an ecclesiology from below. From the perspectives of both authors this method offers a more adequate approach in our historically conscious and theologically critical age. On that premise, we can lay down at least two qualities of a historically conscious ecclesiology that will have a bearing on the subject matter of this essay.

First, an ecclesiology from below not only begins with history but also continues to attend to the existential historical community that calls itself church. The historical point of departure also remains as the consistent referent of what is said about the church. We know nothing of a heavenly church before grasping the church of history. The shift to a historical genetic base or starting point for understanding the church widens the field of vision. A historically conscious ecclesiology from below has to attend to the whole Christian movement. Ecclesiology through the ages and in particular after the Reformation has become a tribal discipline; each church has its own ecclesiology; each finds its own polity reflected in the New Testament, and so on. Against this trend, ecclesiology from below imposes on the ecclesiologist what may be called a "whole-part" optic. One's own particular church is not the whole church, although the whole church in a theological sense is manifest in it; rather, the particular church is both authentic church and part of a larger embodiment of the church of which a single church is a part. (3)

A second quality of ecclesiology from below cautions against a reductionism in a historical and sociological interpretation of the church. The data for ecclesiology include the empirical history of the genesis and development of the church and also the development of the beliefs of the community about its nature and purpose. The church in its beginnings and constantly through its history bears witness to the presence and power of God in its origins, development, religious life, and its future. It lives in and by the power of Christ and the Holy Spirit as the source of the transcendent energy that brought it into being and, as promise, sustains its life into the future. There can be no historicist or sociological reduction of the church in an ecclesiology from below to a merely human organization. The historical data include the confessional witness to a transcendent dimension of the church.

Four Theses on the Relation of General Ecclesiology and Congregational Studies

From the basis of an ecclesiology from below, we can now move to four theses that together broadly define the disciplinary relationship between general ecclesiology and the more focused discipline of congregational studies. The first thesis governs the others: it posits that the study of the church has to be simultaneously historical and theological. From this thesis flow the next three theses, which move in the following direction: on the supposition that the basic unit of the church is the congregation, one can say, broadly speaking, that congregational studies determine the object of ecclesiology. Even so, formal ecclesiology, appealing to theological data, determines the nature and purpose of this social institution. However, the normative theological claims about the church are chastened and measured by congregational studies. The relationship is thus interactive and dynamic. (4)

1. The study of the church must attend simultaneously to the historical and theological character of the church. A very first principle of ecclesiology deserving attention states that the church exists in a twofold relationship: it is simultaneously related to the world and to God. Because of this duality, the church must always be understood simultaneously in two languages: concrete historical language and theological language, sociological language and doctrinal language. (5) With a moment's reflection it becomes self-evident that the church exists in a twofold relationship to the world and to God. The point of making the distinction, then, lies in the attention it focuses on the difference between these relationships so that we can see clearly how they relate to each other. The two relationships coexist and mutually influence and condition each other....