Spirituality
We more often hear people describe themselves as "spiritual not religious" or as "none." How do you understand these descriptions? What experiences give your life meaning? What are your sources of inspiration and what do you do with them in your daily life? Your answers to those questions show your own spirituality. Your spirituality is your spiritual life and that is always something personal, something that your heart is full of.
Christian spirituality is "living by the Spirit." In times when institutions harden and people live 'according to the flesh', the Spirit always initiates creative processes. In every age, God's Spirit seeks our own spirit for ways to continue to believe, hope and love despite the rocks. Spirituality empowers people in their own way on a new and living way of the Lord. It is a process that develops from within. It goes through all of life. Because this quest is personal, different forms of spirituality will always coexist in the church.
The Spirit moves
In those personal searches, people have sometimes found each other. Thus, all centuries have grown through new movements around certain moments of crisis, around certain insights or pioneers. Sometimes these movements led to schisms, but often they have become an enrichment for the entire church. There are many gifts, flowing from one Spirit, and so there are several Christian "spiritualities."
Among Old Catholics there has always been a lot of room for personal search. The independent existence of our Communion has spiritual roots, among many other things. How can we be sincerely Catholic? How does everything we profess in our worship end up in our coexistence? How do we live day by day on the path on which the Spirit puts us in the Sunday liturgy? How do we make the connection between faith and our social commitment? These questions have not led to a single answer. There are many examples that can assist in responding. We may recognize ourselves in one, or more so in something else, but together they give an impression of what our common heart beats for.
Teaching a celebrating church
The truth about God and people is not found in a book or a doctrine, but a person: Jesus Christ. Thus, getting to know the truth is equivalent to getting to know the person Jesus Christ, who does not belong to the past, but – as risen and living Lord – to our present. As Old Catholics, our personal searches for understanding are deepened with the following perspectives, which are by no means definitive, but merely examples:
*Thinking about the dynamic vision of God as a community of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This mindset assumes that God's intention is to restore all creation and bring it together in the community of love that is fundamentally God's own Self. In addition to a vision of God, this way of thinking also influences the vision of the human person, the church and the world.
*Personal responsibility. Clergy do not prescribe law, but rather encourage their fellow believers to make conscious choices in their personal and social lives on the basis of a lived faith. All members of the church are encouraged to take a serious and active stance in acquiring and deepening their knowledge of faith.
*An emphasis on grace: the love God gives us, even before we have asked, earned, or reciprocated God's love. Our faith and good works are not a prerequisite for winning God over to us, but a response to God's love for us.
*The acceptance of the Scriptures... as the testimony par excellence of the special revelation of God. Within the whole of the oral and written tradition of Christianity, the Bible includes the writings of the Old and New Testaments, as well as the 'deuterocanonical' books.
*An emphasis on the first centuries of the church... because the composition and interpretation of the Bible, the doctrine of the faith and the sacramental and ecclesiastical structures interacted with each other in those centuries. The religious decisions of the seven church assemblies (councils) of the first centuries of Christianity are considered normative. This also applies to the original Nicene-Constantinople Creed, without the later insertion of the 'filioque' ("and of the Son"). Religious decisions made after the separation of the churches of the East (Orthodoxy) and the West (Catholicism) around the year 1054 have a less normative character.
*A vision of the sacraments with an emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit. The physical and personal presence of Christ in the celebrating community and in the sacraments is the work of the Holy Spirit. In thinking about church and sacraments, Old Catholic theology, often challenged by issues of contemporary contexts, tries to recalibrate existing practices based on the Bible and insights from the first centuries of the church.
*A hermeneutical (interpretative) understanding of the faith tradition. This means a creative approach to the tension between the Bible, the further faith tradition and one's own time and culture. This attempts to keep the middle ground between the 'fundamentalist' idea that it is sufficient to repeat old statements of faith for knowing the truth and the '(post)modern' idea that only what is conceivable and experienced for contemporary people is credible.
*Truth-finding as an episcopal-synodal process. This refers to a church process, but above all a mentality, in which bishops, priests and deacons have their own role within the whole of the church community, but in which a special role has also been assigned to the input of all believers, the laity. This synodality (literally: 'being on the road together') is concretely demonstrated during regional diocesan and wider gatherings such as church meetings and synods, where believers and clergy search together for the will of God for the church.
*An ecumenical-Catholic vision of the liturgical church... that points us to a restored creation. In this view, the diocese, united in the Eucharist with the bishop's presidency, is the basic unit of being church. This 'local church' is connected to the other 'local churches' through the bishop. This view appears to be largely in line with an ecumenically formulated vision on the basis of which Orthodox, Catholics and Protestants can recognize themselves and each other and possibly recognize each other in the future.
Christian spirituality is "living by the Spirit." In times when institutions harden and people live 'according to the flesh', the Spirit always initiates creative processes. In every age, God's Spirit seeks our own spirit for ways to continue to believe, hope and love despite the rocks. Spirituality empowers people in their own way on a new and living way of the Lord. It is a process that develops from within. It goes through all of life. Because this quest is personal, different forms of spirituality will always coexist in the church.
The Spirit moves
In those personal searches, people have sometimes found each other. Thus, all centuries have grown through new movements around certain moments of crisis, around certain insights or pioneers. Sometimes these movements led to schisms, but often they have become an enrichment for the entire church. There are many gifts, flowing from one Spirit, and so there are several Christian "spiritualities."
Among Old Catholics there has always been a lot of room for personal search. The independent existence of our Communion has spiritual roots, among many other things. How can we be sincerely Catholic? How does everything we profess in our worship end up in our coexistence? How do we live day by day on the path on which the Spirit puts us in the Sunday liturgy? How do we make the connection between faith and our social commitment? These questions have not led to a single answer. There are many examples that can assist in responding. We may recognize ourselves in one, or more so in something else, but together they give an impression of what our common heart beats for.
Teaching a celebrating church
The truth about God and people is not found in a book or a doctrine, but a person: Jesus Christ. Thus, getting to know the truth is equivalent to getting to know the person Jesus Christ, who does not belong to the past, but – as risen and living Lord – to our present. As Old Catholics, our personal searches for understanding are deepened with the following perspectives, which are by no means definitive, but merely examples:
*Thinking about the dynamic vision of God as a community of Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This mindset assumes that God's intention is to restore all creation and bring it together in the community of love that is fundamentally God's own Self. In addition to a vision of God, this way of thinking also influences the vision of the human person, the church and the world.
*Personal responsibility. Clergy do not prescribe law, but rather encourage their fellow believers to make conscious choices in their personal and social lives on the basis of a lived faith. All members of the church are encouraged to take a serious and active stance in acquiring and deepening their knowledge of faith.
*An emphasis on grace: the love God gives us, even before we have asked, earned, or reciprocated God's love. Our faith and good works are not a prerequisite for winning God over to us, but a response to God's love for us.
*The acceptance of the Scriptures... as the testimony par excellence of the special revelation of God. Within the whole of the oral and written tradition of Christianity, the Bible includes the writings of the Old and New Testaments, as well as the 'deuterocanonical' books.
*An emphasis on the first centuries of the church... because the composition and interpretation of the Bible, the doctrine of the faith and the sacramental and ecclesiastical structures interacted with each other in those centuries. The religious decisions of the seven church assemblies (councils) of the first centuries of Christianity are considered normative. This also applies to the original Nicene-Constantinople Creed, without the later insertion of the 'filioque' ("and of the Son"). Religious decisions made after the separation of the churches of the East (Orthodoxy) and the West (Catholicism) around the year 1054 have a less normative character.
*A vision of the sacraments with an emphasis on the work of the Holy Spirit. The physical and personal presence of Christ in the celebrating community and in the sacraments is the work of the Holy Spirit. In thinking about church and sacraments, Old Catholic theology, often challenged by issues of contemporary contexts, tries to recalibrate existing practices based on the Bible and insights from the first centuries of the church.
*A hermeneutical (interpretative) understanding of the faith tradition. This means a creative approach to the tension between the Bible, the further faith tradition and one's own time and culture. This attempts to keep the middle ground between the 'fundamentalist' idea that it is sufficient to repeat old statements of faith for knowing the truth and the '(post)modern' idea that only what is conceivable and experienced for contemporary people is credible.
*Truth-finding as an episcopal-synodal process. This refers to a church process, but above all a mentality, in which bishops, priests and deacons have their own role within the whole of the church community, but in which a special role has also been assigned to the input of all believers, the laity. This synodality (literally: 'being on the road together') is concretely demonstrated during regional diocesan and wider gatherings such as church meetings and synods, where believers and clergy search together for the will of God for the church.
*An ecumenical-Catholic vision of the liturgical church... that points us to a restored creation. In this view, the diocese, united in the Eucharist with the bishop's presidency, is the basic unit of being church. This 'local church' is connected to the other 'local churches' through the bishop. This view appears to be largely in line with an ecumenically formulated vision on the basis of which Orthodox, Catholics and Protestants can recognize themselves and each other and possibly recognize each other in the future.