pecusa and eros spirituality

In his classic work, Eros and Agape, Anders Nygren contrasts two worldviews that flow from two Greek words. These two Greek words, eros and agape, typify two approaches to spirituality, according to theologian David Wells in his book, Above All Earthly Pow'rs. In Eros spirituality, the self is the center. As Wells says

The movement of Eros spirituality is upward. Its essence, its drive, is the sinner

finding God... Eros spirituality is the kind of spirituality which arises from

human nature and it builds on the presumption that it can forge its own

salvation... Eros is the projection of the human spirit into eternity, the

immortalizing of its own impulses... Eros is human love... Human love of this

kind, because it has need and want at its center, because it is always

wanting to have it needs and wants satisfied, will always seek to control the

object of its desires. p. 159

This has been the trajectory of pecusa, particularly in its acceptance of the biblically unacceptable notions concerning human sexuality. The pecusa worldview is centered not in God but in society. When a group of people comes into the church and demands rights that are clearly at odds with Scripture, pecusa redefines Scripture. Contrast this way with Agape spirituality.

Agape spirituality is God-centered and its movement is downward. The drive of Agape spirituality is God reaching down and seeking out sinners. As Wells says,

Agape arises in God, was incarnate in Christ, and reaches us through

the work of the Holy Spirit opening lives to receive the gospel of

Christ's saving death...Agape is the intrusion of eternity into the fabric

of life coming, not from below, but from above. ibid.

Wells concludes,

This is why in these new spiritualities it is the spiritual person who

makes up his or her beliefs and practices, mixing and matching and

experimenting to see what works best, and assuming the prerogative

to discard at will. ibid.

Is this not what pecusa has done through General Conventions and diocesan practices? As Ephraim Radner and others have pointed out, whatever theological justification pecusa has cobbled together has been incoherent at best (exhibit one is "To Set Our Hope on Christ"). When you discard Scripture and start from society you can't get to biblical norms no matter how much you try to reinterpret Scripture.

Wells points out,

Contemporary spiritualities must be recognized as a form of temptation.

The question they raise, as Barth rightly suggested, is whether the

Church is able to take its own revelation seriously. For what these

spiritualities do is to invite the Church, theology, and faith "to abandon

their theme and object and become hollow and empty, mere shadows

of themselves." p. 160, quote from Barth, Church Dogmatics

It couldn 't be any clearer that pecusa does not take the church's own revelation seriously. Furthermore, is there really any doubt that pecusa has become hollow and empty, a mere shadow of the formidable church that she once was?