Are we being honest to God?: A critical look at Christian worship, priesthood and authority
The central theme running through all five chapters is the way the image of God shown in and through the person of Jesus Christ has become distorted in the main-stream Churches, resulting in many of the practices and doctrines of worship, priesthood and authority not being ‘honest to God’.
It explores the biblical understanding of worship, particularly with reference to Jesus’ teaching about worship in ‘spirit and truth’, and compares this with the language, terminology and doctrines used in the Churches today which contain neo-pagan expressions of appeasement and obeisance.
The subject of ‘altar sacrifice’ is explored in the context of the rise of a cultic priesthood, the members of which became mediators of God’s ‘grace’. How did such a situation arise in contrast to the teaching of Jesus about himself being the only mediator for our access to God, and about his Father wanting mercy and not sacrifice?
What kind of ‘authority’ did Jesus give and teach to his disciples and apostles? Was it the kind which we now experience in the main-stream Churches, particularly in the Roman Catholic Church, as one in which office-holders rule and govern or was it one in which leaders are to guide, teach, care for and feed the People of God?
Is the Christian Church, particularly in its Roman Catholic form, ‘fit for purpose’? Are there radical changes needed for that purpose to be realised? Are its forms and structures for ministering to the People of God suitable for that purpose? Is it really being ‘honest to God’?
A Catholic Christian for nearly 60 years, as husband, father, grandfather, theologian, Brian Pointer poses radical questions and some answers about the Church.
The book's sounding board is my belief in a creator God who can be detected in everyday life, inspiring and enthusing us each day.
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In this book, Gerald O'Collins, SJ, takes a systematic look at the 2010 English translation of the Roman Missal and the ways it fails to achieve what the Second Vatican
Council mandated: the full participation of priest and people. Critiquing the unsatisfactory principles prescribed by the Vatican instruction Liturgiam Authe
nticam (2001), this book, which includes a chapter by John Wilkins:
- tells the story of the maneuverings that sidelined the 1998 translation approved by eleven conferences of English-speaking bishops,
- criticiz
es the 2010 translation, and
- illustrates the clear superiority of the 1998 translation, the "Missal that never was"
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AWAKENING
'A remarkable contribution to solving women's inequality as one of the biggest problems within the Catholic Church today'.
Luca Badini Confalonieri, PhD in Theology (Dunelm),
Wijngaards Institute for Catholic Research
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Great Catholic Parishes
The Book Werner used in his talk at the National Conference
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