Logorrhea

God's Culture

I appeal to you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may prove what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect. Rom. XII 1-2.

With the constant innovations of TEC to conform the Church to human ideas of what is good for them instead of transforming they’re minds and culture to conform to God’s culture (ie. the kingdom of God). I wanted to think about what “God’s culture” is as prescribed by scripture and how we should obediently subject ourselves to it. As I thought about “culture” I thought about difficult passages in the bible that are overlooked and commonly described as being cultural motivated and so not currently mandated (or now culturally insignificant). One of those passages is in I Cor. XI (the one about women having their heads covered in Church). Head covings, naturally lead me to think of Islam. I once had a Christian friend of mine tell me that he respected Muslims because ‘they are better Christians then I am.’ By this he meant he respected their commitment and obedience to the law and how it was a visible witness to him. Now I’m not a legalistic fundamentalist Christian, but I could see his point. Christians use our Freedom and God’s Grace to ignore the fact that the gospel necessitates a transformation of our culture in all spheres (even fashion). The problem with fundamentalists is that they actually don't interpret the bible literally enough, especially when it comes to the sacraments. They are willing to overlook mandates in the bible as they relate to the sacraments and call them rituals, so as not to look too Catholic, and therefore lose the free gift of grace given to us through them by God. Also with the head covering; a fundamentalist would say it is not the article of clothing that's important but the attitude. Both are important. So, as with the sacraments its not just a mandated "ritual activity" but true faith and worship, that is obedient service.

When Paul says we should be “living sacrifices” he’s talking about living sacramentally, that is as an “outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace.” I know this argument is probably not strong enough to say that the bible mandates women to wear hand coverings in Church but at least you would have to agree that it would be a good idea (not even mentioning Paul’s ideas on Authority).

Anglo-Catholics have a very particular fashion sense as it relates to Church and the celebration of the mass. What the priests wear, not only what they do, can can tell you whether or not a church is traditional Anglo-Catholic, therefore orthodoxy in its doctrine. The "fiddle-back" chasuble and birretta are two articles of vestments that are often only worn by catholic priests.... By the way, the head covering or veil is still mandated to be worn according to the Canon’s of the Roman Catholic Church (it’s just not enforced). Here’s a link for more info.