michael ramsey

I am sure the world is wondering, "What is WB reading this Summer?" Well, WB is reading "The Christian Priest Today" by Archbishop Michael Ramsey, of blessed memory.

Here is something Ramsey says, something we would be doing well to consider.

It is not that some of the images of God are "better" than others, but that all are needed ("height" and "depth", "king" and "father"), all are inadequate, and all subserve the divine Word, living, active, sharper than a two-edged sword and piercing to the dividing of our human faculties. Without the realization of thie the idea of God in our minds may be "sicklied o'er with the pale cast" of conventionalism. Is not this liable to happen? I am sure you will find many devout people for whom this has happened.

My commentary, in brevis: I don't think this is a big concern for your average Episcopal clergyman. If anything, its the opposite. We are too anxious to move into the noche oscura de la alma of St. John of the Cross, running right past the fact of God's decidedly conventional self-revelation as Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. No, indeed, this is, if anything, a danger primarilly for, as ArchBp. Ramsey noted, "devout people" without theological training. The sort of octagenerians one finds charmingly thumbing their rosarios in southern Europe, and from whose piety we Episcopal clergymen could learn much, namely about God as Father, King, Judge, etc.

By the way, you can buy the book here.