Ironic, isn’t it, that Reformation Day occurs on the eve of All Saints Day? The day before we remember all the Saints and Doctors of the church, we remember the tragic rending of the church. Perhaps this is fitting, in a sad and ironical sort of way.
However, on this day, when our eye (should!) naturally turn toward the disunity of the una sancta catholica et apostolica Ecclesia I would like to turn my eyes to the rest of the Nicene confession of the church. The critique that the historic apostolic churches have of the churches of the Reformation is most centrally their lack of apostolic succession and visible unity with the church. I don’t want to try to dodge this critique. However, I want us, on this tragic day to remember that the church is not simply constituted by its being the catholica, for the church to be itself it must also be holy and apostolic. With Lesslie Newbigin I believe it is meaningless to say that a member of the church may sin, but the church never sins. Such a statement borders on the absurdity of saying that while American soldiers may torture enemy combatants, that America itself doesn’t torture anybody.
My point in all this is point out that all churches, be they Catholic, Orthodox, or protestant have sinned, have compromised the apostolic mission, and have fallen into disunity. We all stand under judgment, living solely upon the divine mercy. As Newbigin stated over fifty years ago:
From its very beginnings the Church faces us with the dark mystery of sin by which she lives and acts in a manner that contradicts her essential nature. She who is essentially one is divided; she who is holy is unclean; she who is essentially apostolic forgets her missionary task. No doctrine of the Church can be true which does not match this dark mystery of sin in the Church with a doctrine of the divine grace profound enough to deal with it without evasion, and which does not in some measure explain how a body which by sin denies its own nature is yet accepted by God and used as a means of his grace. I have sought to show that the Church’s unity and continuity are of it’s esse and cannot be treated as secondary and dispensable elements in its life. But it is no less of the esse of the Church that it should be holy, and that it should be apostolic, which I take to mean both holding the apostolic faith and prosecuting the apostolic mission to the world. A Church which denies any of these elements in its life denies its essential being. Having done so, it can exist as a Church only by the sheer grace and mercy of God. Holiness and apostolicity belong, equally with unity, to the essence of the Church. … With regard to what the Church ought to be, I think we have every ground to insist that our Lord has given us very clear directions indeed. But with regard to what we are, I think we must simply say that God has concluded all under sin that He may have mercy on all.
–Lesslie Newbigin, Household of God (New York: Friendship Press, 1953), 91-92.
My hope on this day is that we all, in some small way remember that we all depend on the mercy of God to remain his Church. For our part, as the “wild olive shoots”, we protestants stand condemned for our lack of visible unity, just as the churches always and everywhere stand condemned for their lack of holiness, for their compromised apostolicity. We all live as Churches solely by the mercies of God. We who were no people are now a people. And so, on this day, when we remember our failures to be his faithful people, let us not cease to sing the songs of Zion, to chant the creed of Nicea, and to proclaim the mystery of faith. For by God’s grace we are not left alone. “If we are faithless, he remains faithful, for he cannot deny himself.”
it was, a clash of civilizations, and of being too weak to do what was necessary, which was to spill blood to defeat the enemy. Along the way he told us who his choice for president was right now — Rudy Giuliani — and that Obama was a fool, Clinton was a pandering closet fundamentalist, and that he was less than thrilled about all the support among the FFRF for the Democratic party. We cannot afford to allow the Iranian theocracy to arm itself with nuclear weapons (something I entirely sympathize with), and that the only solution is to go in there with bombs and marines and blow it all up. The way to win the war is to kill so many Moslems that they begin to question whether they can bear the mounting casualties.
In the most recent season of South Park we have been given a wonderful two-part episode dedicated entirely to atheism, and particularly to Richard Dawkins (though you could substitute Sam Harris or Christopher Hitchens and the story would remain absolutely the same since these guys are all pretty much clones of each other). 
himself embroiled in the vicious wars which are currently raging between the various factions of atheists who war of which answer to the “great question” (which turns out to be what atheists should call themselves) is more scientific. So, as the United Atheist League, the United Atheist Alliance and the Allied Atheist Alliance (this one made up entirely of the now-sentient atheist sea-otters) war with one another and seek to annihilate each other completely, all the while rejoicing joyously at the absence of the foolish religions of the past.
Peppered throughout are razor-sharp lines like when Stan Marsh questions Dawkins, asking genuinely if evolution might be the answer to “how” and not the answer to “why”, only to be slapped in the dunce chair by Garrison with the dunce cap reading “I have faith.” Or likewise, when Garrison, prior to being converted to atheism by the eloquent Dawkins states that he’s not an atheist because “you can’t disprove God.” Dawkins then responds “Well, you can’t disprove that there’s a flying spaghetti monster either, so should I believe in a flying spaghetti monster?” To which Garrison (channeling the writers, I assure you) responds, “Oh WOW, you’re right! THANK YOU, RICHARD! It’s so simple! God’s a spaghetti monster! Guess what everyone? I’m an atheist!!”
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