The Trees and the Forrester

By Eric Von Salzen

It seems that Kevin Thew Forrester’s selection as Bishop of Northern Michigan has not been approved. People whose opinions I respect opposed his elevation, so I’m sure that it’s a good thing that he will not be a bishop.

I haven’t posted anything, here or elsewhere, about this controversy, because I frankly found it well above my pay grade. When people start arguing about what Gregory of Nyssa, or Nicholas of Cusa, or Julian of Norwich, said, well I’m darn proud to say I recognize the names (thank you EFM!), but I couldn’t begin to figure out whose interpretation is right.

And that brings me to my point. How do the opponents of Thew Forrester answer the folks in the pews if they ask why this fellow shouldn’t be a bishop? The folks in the pews don’t know Gregory of Nyssa from Gregory Peck, and probably think that Julian of Norwich is a dress designer. I suspect that their eyes would glaze over if you tried to explain the fine points of atonement theology, or the Doctrine of Theosis, or the difference between pantheism and panentheism (that last one even confuses my spell-checker).

The “Muslim Priest” was an easy call. Most folks can understand that the Episcopal Church can’t have a priest who’s a Muslim – some folks may disagree with that decision, but they can understand it. If Thew Forrester could have been fairly dubbed a “Buddhist Bishop”, that would have made it easy to explain why he couldn’t be a bishop of the Episcopal Church. That’s how Wikipedia handles it, describing Thew Forrester as controversial “due to [his] status as a Christian who practices Zen Buddhist meditation.” But as I read the comments of Thew Forrester’s opponents on Anglican Centrist, it really wouldn’t be accurate to say that Buddhism is why so many serious orthodox Episcopalians opposed him.

Back in March, Father Jones posted a sermon by Thew Forrester on Anglican Centrist. It’s the only Thew Forrester sermon I’ve read, and I found it turgid, boring, and unconvincing, but not outside the wide range of views that we tolerate in the Episcopal Church. Frankly, I’ve heard worse in several Episcopal churches. So how does one explain to the folks in the pews why he couldn’t be a bishop?

One answer, of course, is not to try to explain it to laymen. You could say: Look, this is a theological issue, you wouldn’t understand. So just trust the judgment of the bishops, priests, and other scholars of theology that Thew Forrester’s views are beyond the pale.

There are two problems with that approach. First, Episcopalians as a group aren’t sheep-like enough to take that for an answer. Second, and more important, to duck the issue that way would be to miss a real teaching opportunity. If his heterodoxy regarding atonement theology (etc.) is serious enough to justify denying Thew Forrester the cathedra, then isn’t it important that Episcopal laypeople understand and appreciate what atonement theology means and why it matters?

I suspect that a lot of good Episcopalians have no clue that there’s anything wrong with “replacing references to salvation with references to union with God”. “Union with God”? That sure sounds religious doesn’t it? Just as Dan Brown’s book, The Da Vinci Code, provided an opportunity to educate people about the teachings and history of the Christian church, perhaps the Thew Forrester episode can be an opportunity to educate lay people about some important theological issues.

Of course, a 15-minute sermon isn’t ideally suited to dealing with complex theological issues. Churches need to provide other opportunities for laypeople to learn about what our religion is all about. But sermons can be a good way to alert laypeople to the issues and encourage them to seek more knowledge about them. A “theological” sermon can be dull, of course (as Thew Forrester himself proved on Trinity Sunday 2008), but it doesn’t have to be. For example, on Trinity Sunday 2009, I happened to be at St. Michael’s, Raleigh, and heard an excellent and enlightening sermon about the Trinity (as difficult a theological issue as you can find). None of the listeners looked bored to me, and they learned some theology, too, whether they knew it or not. Unfortunately, the sermon hasn’t been posted (yet?) on the St. Michael’s website – perhaps Father Jones will read this post and take the hint. Reading the sermon, however, won’t be the same as being there, because Greg Jones began the sermon by singing the first few lines of St. Patrick’s Breastplate. Theology and music! That’s the ticket.