… being a continuation of the second subsection of the sixth chapter of Being as Communion.
In insisting on the relational character of ministry, Zizioulas points out that this is not something abstract and logical, but has a deeply ontological and soteriological meaning. This means both that the act of dividing the community into ministries actually unites it and also that it is
an act by which the Church and, through her, mankind and creation are brought into the reconciling and saving relationship with God which has been realized in Christ. (220)
Thus the ministry renders the Church a relational reality. However, because this reality is realised within fallen existence and the presence of evil,
this relational nature of the Church is constantly revealed by way of a double movement: (i) as a baptismal movement which renders the Church a community existentially “dead to the world” and separated from it, and (ii) as a eucharistic movement which relates the world to God by “referring” it to God as anaphora and by bringing to it the blessings of God’s life and the taste of the Kingdom to come. It is this double movement of the Church’s relational nature that makes the ministry realize its relational character as a movement of the Church both ad intra and ad extra. (221)
Nevertheless it is the Church’s ministries ad intra that received priority and came to be seen as decisive very early on in the Church’s history and Zizioulas argues that we should view this development as positive rather than negative. However,
The tragedy with regard to this development lies in the fact that theology soon lost the proper perspective which is suggested by the organic like of these ministries [of laity, deacons, presbyters and bishop] within the structure of the eucharistic assembly, and thus, given other historical and theological factors, the view of these orders as relational realities making sense only in their interdependence in the community was replaced by an approach to them as individual offices, with all the well-known consequences for the history of the Church and of theology. (221-222)
If the relational character of these orders is recaptured, then this will affect two areas of theology:
(a) The distinctiveness and indispensability of each of the orders will become apparent.
The laity will thus become the laos who is gathered from the world to realize in the community of the Church the eschatological unity and salvation of the world in Christ. The deacons, whose existence causes so much embarrassment to the theology of the ministry precisely because their eucharistic role has been lost, will regain their profound significance as bearers of the world (in the form of the gifts and petitions of the faithful) to the head of the eucharistic community in order to bring them back again to the world (in the form of the Holy Communion) as a sign of the new creation which is realized in the communion with God’s life. The presbyters will become again the synedrion of the community portraying in liturgical as well as in actual terms the important and lost dimension of judgment with which the Church relates both ad intra and with the world. Finally, the bishop will cease to be everything and become the head of the community that unites it in itself and with other communities in time and space – a prerogative important enough to give him the place of the unique ordainer and all the high honor it implies, yet always and only because of his relation to the community and in interdependence with the rest of the orders. (222-223)
(b) Such a relational view of ministry makes any resistance to an “institution” pointless.
Authority being tied up with a ministry understood as an objectified office and as potestas naturally becomes oppressive and provokes revolutionary reactions. On the other hand, in a relational view of the ministry, authority establishes itself as a demand of the relationship itself. Thus the Church becomes hierarchical in the sense in which the Holy Trinity is itself hierarchical: by reason of the specificity of relationship. (223)
Zizioulas then proceeds to consider the Church’s ministry ad extra. This existentially conditions the Church’s ontology and means that:
(a) There cannot be a separation between Church and world in the sense of a dichotomy, for
As it is revealed in the eucharistic nature of the Church, the world is assumed by the community and referred back to the Creator. In a eucharistic approach it is by being assumed that the world is judged, and not otherwise. (224)
(b) The only acceptable method of mission is an incarnational one in which the Church is existentially involved in the world.
The nature of mission is not to be found in the Church’s addressing the world but in its being fully in com-passion with it. (224)
(c) This ministry must be an organic part of a concrete local community and not vague ideas about mission, for
no form of such a ministry can exist without being organically related to the concrete eucharistic community. (225)
(d) The Church must always have a variety of ministries ad extra which correspond to the needs of time and place in which she exists, and for this reason they cannot become permanent ministries, unlike the ministries ad intra.
November 12, 2011
It is better to practice and not to teach than to teach and not to practice
Posted by Macrina Walker under Church Fathers & Mothers, Ministry, Scripture commentary[2] Comments
“Even so let your light shine before other, in order that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven.” That is to say, so shine and teach, not only that people may hear your words but also that they may see your good works. Let those you illumine by the light of your words be seasoned by the salt of your works. For the one who teaches and practices what he teaches, teaches truly. But one who does not practice what he teaches does not teach anyone but casts a bad light on himself. And it is better to practice and not to teach than to teach and not to practice. Because one who practices, though he may keep silent, corrects some people by his example. But one who teaches and does not practice not only corrects no one but even scandalizes many. For who is not tempted to sin when he sees the teachers of goodness committing sins? Therefore the Lord is magnified through those teachers who teach and practice. He is blasphemed through those who teach and do not practice. …
The church leader should be equipped with all the virtues. He should be poor, so that he can chastise greed with a free voice. He should always be someone who sighs at inordinate pleasure, whether in himself or in others. He is ready to confront those who do not hesitate before they sin and those who do not feel sorry for having sinned after they sin. So let him sigh and lament. Let him show thereby that this world is difficult and dangerous for the faithful. He should be somebody who hungers and thirsts for justice, so that he might have the strength confidently to arouse by God’s Word those who are lazy in good works. He knows how to use the whip of rebuke, but more by his example than by his voice. He should be gentle. He rules the church more by mercy than by punishment. He desires more to be loved than feared. He should be merciful to others but severe with himself. He sets on the scales a heavy weight of justice for himself but for others a light weight. He should be pure of heart. He does not entangle himself in earthly affairs, but more so he does not even think of them.
Anonymous, Incomplete Work on Matthew, Homily 10, quoted in Manlio Simonetti (ed), Matthew 1-13 (Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture), 95.