Several of these questions and her responses intrigued me, so I'll copy those questions to Schori, document her responses, then I'll add my responses to her responses, and if you are not asleep by that point I'll finish with a bit of commentary! That will surely finish you off. I'll state up front that it is hard to reconstruct her worldview from a few quick interview questions, but I think we can quickly grasp her emphasis and what she desires the church to be.
What will be your focus as head of the U.S. church?
Schori: Our focus needs to be on feeding people who go to bed hungry, on providing primary education to girls and boys, on healing people with AIDS, on addressing tuberculosis and malaria, on sustainable development. That ought to be the primary focus.
Dave: These are admirable goals, and are freed from ambiguity. It makes me think of Matthew 5:16 - "let your light shine before men in such a way that they see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven". What seems to be missing from Schori's response though is God!
The Westminster Shorter Catechism asks "what is the chief end of man"? The answer is "Man's chief end is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever". Jesus said in John 10:37 "If I do not do the works of My Father, do not believe Me...". Perhaps she is making the assumption that the interviewer and reader would take the stance of a relationship with God as the foundation and from that foundation the social focus would be primary. However, that stretches into eisegesis (reading into the text, rather than drawing out from the text). She is clear about her primary focus.
Now this is just a sound bite from Schori, but from this snippet I would think that the primary focus should be to know and bring glory to God, and out of this relationship we show our concern and compassion in tangible ways.
Is belief in Jesus the only way to get to heaven?
Schori: We who practice the Christian tradition understand him as our vehicle to the divine. But for us to assume that God could not act in other ways is, I think, to put God in an awfully small box.
Dave: Fascinating response - surely God is bigger than we could ever understand and His creativity is seen in, but also transcends; this space, time and dimension we live in. But the revelation of God and the plan for getting to heaven (i.e. salvation) is clearly communicated. But none other than Jesus himself seems to indicate that there is a "small box" - in Matthew 7:13 Jesus exhorts us to:
"Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it."
In John 14:6 Jesus makes this startling and exclusionary profession (John 14:6) "I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life - no man comes to the Father except by me". On the cross, Jesus makes a reference that it (the plan of redemption) is finished (John 19:30).
If the small box analogy must be used, I think a modified response might be something like "rather than think that the way to salvation exists in a small box, as Christians we focus on what is inside the box. We find that in opening that little box, that it seems endless in the marvels it contains." We look at at scriptures like this and find our hope expressed:
"that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner man." (Ephesians 3:16)
"Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and unfathomable His ways!" (Romans 11:33)
Schori: Chapter 61 of Isaiah is an icon for me of what Christian work should be about. That's what Jesus reads in His first public act. In Luke, he walks into the synagogue and reads from Isaiah. It talks about a vision of the reign of God where those who are mourning are comforted, where the hungry are fed, where the poor hear good news.
Dave: I love that passage, what a vivid and inspiring vision. When Jesus quoted Isaiah in Luke, he finishes by stating that "The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him, and he began by saying to them, "Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing." Can you imagine the scene? The news of Jesus had been spreading like wildfire, the chat rooms and texting filled the whole countryside of Galilee. Jesus then makes this bold statement, and all eyes are riveted upon him. He just claimed to be The One! My point is that although we acknowledge the compassion, we cannot separate the message from the Messiah.
Here then is my commentary:
I admire Schori's goals, but there is something missing to me. Do you sense it too? To me, her vision is horizontal - focused on man. When Jesus was challenged in Matthew 22 by the Jewish sect known as the Pharisees (teachers and expositors of the Old Testament law) who asked him what was the greatest commandment, Jesus quoted from the passage known as the Shema (Deuteronomy 6). This passage was central to the Jewish faith, and Jesus quotes verse 5 which states that we must "Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength". That response alone would have satisfied the Pharisees, and justified their attempts at living a legalistic lifestyle.
Returning to Matthew 22 But Jesus goes on to qualify his response: "This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: 'Love your neighbor as yourself.' All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments."
Schori seems to have gotten the order reversed, mankind first and then God. But she doesn't even mention God! I prayed for her when I read the interview, that her heart would be captured by God's glory, majesty, and holiness. Out of that understanding flows the kinds of actions that testify to our love for God.
