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1. The unique significance of Jesus Christ

9. The basis for the Christian Church’s understanding of the unique significance of Jesus Christ lies in the affirmation of the oneness of God which is found in the Old Testament in passages such as the following: To you it was shown so that you would acknowledge that the Lord is God; there is no other besides him (Deuteronomy 4:35); And Ezra said: “You are the Lord, you alone; you have made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth and all that is on it, the seas and all that is in them. To all of them you give life, and the host of heaven worships you.” (Nehemiah 9:6) I am the Lord, and there is no other; besides me there is no God; I arm you, though you do not know me, so that they may know from the rising of the sun and from the west, that there is none besides me; I am the Lord, and there is no other. (Isaiah 45:5-6).

10. In passages such as these, and in its overall storyline, the Old Testament teaches that The Lord, the God of Israel, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is unique because he is ‘the one living and true God’ (Article I). It is he who has created and who upholds the universe and everything that exists within it and he is the sole ruler of history.

11. On the basis of Jesus’ teaching about himself and his mission and on the basis of his life, death, resurrection and ascension the first Christians came to believe that, in accordance with the promises that he had made to his people, the God of Israel, in the person of Jesus, ‘took Man’s nature in the womb of the blessed Virgin, of her substance’(Article II) in order to proclaim God’s kingdom and to bring it in by reconciling the whole universe through his life, death and resurrection. They also held that after his resurrection Jesus ascended into heaven and at the end 3 of the age he will come in glory to judge the living and the dead and to finally and fully manifest the kingly rule of God over all of creation.

12. The first Christians therefore believed that Jesus was God incarnate. This belief can be seen in passages such as: John 1:14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth; we have beheld his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father; Colossians 1:19 For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of his cross; Hebrews 1:2-2 Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a Son, who he appointed heir to all things, through whom he also created the worlds. He is the reflection of God’s glory and the exact imprint of God’s very being, and he sustains all things by his powerful word.

13. Although the first Christians believed that Jesus was divine they did not believe that God was simply Jesus. On the basis of the same evidence that had led them to believe that Jesus was God they also believed that God exists also as the Father, the one to whom Jesus prayed, to whom Jesus was obedient, who raised Jesus from the dead and to whom Jesus would hand over the kingdom at the end of time. On the same grounds they further believed that God exists as the Holy Spirit, the one who had dwelt in Jesus and empowered his mission and whom Jesus had poured out on his followers on the day of Pentecost.

14. The first Christians thus redefined the Old Testament belief in the oneness of God, holding that the Lord, the one God of Israel, exists as the Father, the Son who had become incarnate in Jesus and as the Holy Spirit. This redefinition can be seen in passages such as I Corinthians 8:6 ‘For us there is one God, the Father, from whom are all things and for whom we exist, and one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom are all things and through whom we exist’ and Ephesians 4:4-6 ‘There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called to the one hope of your calling, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is above all and through all and in all.’

15. Where the first Christians led the Church of the Patristic period followed. When in the early centuries of the Church’s existence people called into question the full deity of the Son or the Spirit or the true humanity of Jesus the Church re-affirmed both in the Apostles, Nicene and Athanasian Creeds and in the Chalcedonian definition.

16. There were Fathers such as St. Justin Martyr and St Clement of Alexandria who emphasised that all human beings could have access to some knowledge of God through the universal presence of God’s Word or Reason (the Greek word logos could mean both). According to them it was this knowledge of God that led to the elements of truth in Greek philosophy and poetry and also led people like Socrates to criticise pagan religion. 2

17. However, belief in this universal revelation did not lead these Fathers to call into question the unique significance of Jesus Christ. On the contrary, they argued that, as prophesied by the Old Testament and testified to in the New, the divine Word and Reason were incarnate in Jesus Christ who suffered, died, rose and ascended to set us free from sin and death. It was in Jesus  that the divine Word and Reason were thus fully revealed and all who wanted to live lives that were truly in accordance with them therefore needed to live as disciples of Christ within the fellowship of the Church.

18. As a church that belongs to ‘the One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church worshipping the one true God, Father, Son and Holy Spirit’ and professing ‘the faith uniquely revealed in the Holy Scriptures and set forth in the catholic creeds’ (Canon C.15), the Church of England follows the lead of the first Christians and the Church of the Patristic period. It bears witness in its historic formularies to the God who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit and who became incarnate in Jesus. It is this God whom it proclaims in its mission and evangelism. It is this God in whose name it baptises people.

19. It is its faith in this God that is also the basis for the Church of England’s engagement with people of all religions and none. It believes that the God it confesses is the source of salvation which is offered to all people everywhere (whether they are yet aware of the fact or not), and the ultimate source of the values that it shares in common with them. But it also holds that, in obedience to the commission given by Jesus to his disciples (Matt 28:18-20,Acts 1:8), all Christians are called to act as God’s instruments in bringing people to explicit faith in Jesus Christ and to membership of his Church through baptism.

Reference 2 See St Justin Martyr First and Second Apologies in The Ante Nicene Fathers, vol 1, Edinburgh and Grand Rapids: T&T Clark/Eerdmans, 1996, pp. 163-193 and St Clement of Alexandria Exhortation to the Heathen, and The Instructor in The Ante Nicene Fathers, vol 2, Edinburgh and Grand Rapids: T&T Clark/Eerdmans, 2001, pp. 171-298. 4

World Faiths, New Religious Movements and Secularism

58. It is sometimes helpful to use a three-fold model to look at the challenges posed to the church by the contemporary “religious geography” of Britain. First, there are the great world Faiths, present both through the faith and practice of fellow British citizens and as global phenomena impacting on our understanding of ourselves as global citizens.

59. Second, there are the New Religious Movements and Alternative Spiritualities – bodies without the long histories, extensive literature and evolved traditions of the great world religions.

60. Thirdly, there are the philosophies which are to some extent represented organisationally by two main bodies: the National Secular Society and the British Humanist Association. These bodies are relatively small in membership terms but claim to reflect the views of a much wider constituency.

61. The boundaries between these three groupings are contested (for instance, some pagans make the contested claim to be a more ancient religion in Britain than Christianity; some argue that the growth of NRMs is a by-product of secularisation, etc.). However, the Church seeks to differentiate between these three categories which suggest something of the complexity of relationships within which the church’s mission takes place. 8 For example in Acts 1:8; Luke 24: 47—49; John 20: 21; Mark 13: 10. 11

62. One of the complexities of relating to other great world faiths is that, like Christianity itself, most faiths have an ongoing conversation between adherents about what it means to be a good member of that faith community. Christianity, like Islam, Judaism or other faiths with centuries of practice and politics behind them, is not one story, one set of practices or one structure of authority. (One is reminded of Fr. Chantry-Pigg’s Anglo-Catholic mission to Turkey in Rose Macaulay’s novel The Towers of Trebizond and his shocked reaction to a Billy Graham crusade. Christian mission is not one set of practices either!).

63. NRMs are too numerous to sum up in general terms, but some could be categorised as being derived from great world faiths. Jehovah’s Witnesses, for instance, draw upon, even as they alter and add to, the central narratives of Christianity, and the Ahmadi community claims to Muslim identity are strongly contested by mainstream Islam. Others, such as Scientology, have no identifiable historical connections. These different lineages are important to bear in mind when discerning potential points of convergence and disagreement in the encounter with Christian missions. The Gospel and its reception

64. Many within the great world faiths will share disquiet about the dominance of secularist thinking in British society today. Not all, however, are agreed in their analysis of what is going on – it is not a simple matter of “people of faith” versus “secular humanism”. Differences of emphasis in relating to modernity are to be found within Christianity as within other faiths. For example, Christian theology is often quite comfortable with a modernist focus on the individual as moral agent which contrasts with the more strongly communitarian focus of pre-modern times.

65. Christianity has especially interesting complexities here, since the Enlightenment itself (often seen as the harbinger of contemporary secularism) developed in Christian Europe largely amongst people who saw Enlightenment values as the embodiment of Christian virtues. The relationship between the Enlightenment and the Reformation is fascinating, contentious and far too big a subject for this paper!

66. Other faiths may share an ambivalence about the fruits of the Enlightenment, but the tension is perhaps most acute amongst Christians. Some Christians involved in evangelism amongst Muslims note that the call to personal decision is overshadowed in Islamic history and culture by more communal understandings and a more communitarian Christian theology may be especially resonant as a tool of mission.

67. This takes us back to the comment in Towards the Conversion of England that some aspects of Christian theology are more easily communicable to Muslims than other doctrines. The wording of that report may be very dated, but the sentiment is important. Similar observations could be made about communicating Christian ideas to members of all other religions.

68. Towards the Conversion of England made many good points about how effective mission involves the simultaneous ability to speak the language of contemporary culture(s) and the ability to address the gaps which cultures ignore – the human longing expressed in the (often unspoken) question, “there must be more to life than this”. The missioner or evangelist (on a Pauline model) must be fluent in the ways of contemporary cultures and in the eternal truths of the gospel. This is as true in encounters with people of other faiths as it is with those whose faith is lapsed or non-existent. Somehow, all these languages must be made comprehensible to each other.

69. It remains true that mission and evangelism are much more than exercises in propositional knowledge. Words without example are not likely to convince, and it is the example of the Christian community in its ability to mediate God’s love through its own corporate life which may be the essential background to evangelism. At the same time, words are still important and often inescapable. Testimony stands alongside practice and the words used must connect with the life in the Christian family. This centrality of the Church – the real, empirical, Church, not just an ideal construct – means that mission always requires ecclesiology. The nature of the community which sends us is key to our identity as missioners.

70. And yet we live in a culture where words are received, interpreted and disseminated with extraordinary speed – often to the detriment of nuanced understanding. While this points to the importance of the face-to-face dimension in mission and evangelism, where time and trust can enable deep understanding, it also alerts us to the need to be “media-savvy” and to recognise how our words and actions can be (mis)interpreted by unsympathetic cultures.