Equipos hidromecánicos

Newbigin‟s ecclesiology has some clear similarities with the ecclesiology of Gustavo Gutierrez in A Theology of Liberation. Gutierrez locates the church‟s mission in relation to the kingdom of God as a present reality but also in terms of its eschatological realization, as he states: “This liberating praxis endeavors to transform

223 _{I. Murray, The Puritan Hope, 171.}

224 _{D. Bosch, Transforming Mission, 322. The „pre‟ and „post‟ traditionally refer to whether Christ‟s}

millennial rule described in Revelations 20, occurs before, or after his return. These positions can be distinguished by pre-millenial‟s greater sense of the imminence of Christ‟s return and stress on verbal proclamation of the gospel and post-millenialism‟s greater emphasis on the whole of social and cultural life gradually being permeated by the values of the kingdom.

225 _{D. Bosch, Transforming Mission, 323. Bosch points to, among others, Grattan Guiness‟s Regions}

Beyond Missionary Union. Their training college, the East London Institute for Home and Foreign Missions trained 1,400-1,500 missionaries between 1873 and its closure in 1915 (Brian Stanley, „The Future in the Past: Eschatological Vision in British and American Protestant Missionary History,‟

Tyndale Bulletin 51.1 (2000), 105.

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Stanley points out that Grattan Guinness, while being a premillenialist, did have the expectation of gospel values permeating some areas of social life, while simultaneously pointing to the growth of various manifestations of evil („The Future in the Past,‟ 108).

61 history in the light of the reign of God.”227

The kingdom of God is the guide for action in the present: Gutierrez writes that “the attraction of “what is to come” is the driving force of history.”228

Yet the reign of God will “arrive in its fullness only at the end of times.” With language similar to Newbigin, Gutierrez writes that, “The church must be a sign of the kingdom within human history.”229

The similarity with Newbigin is particularly clear in his discussion of Vatican II‟s “new ecclesiological perspective” in which the Church is viewed “as a sacrament.”230

This idea of the church as a sacrament, in Gutierrez‟s interpretation, gathers up in one concept Newbigin‟s identification of the church as sign, instrument and foretaste of the eschatological community of all people gathered into one in Christ, as he states:

The fulfillment and the manifestation of the will of the Father occur in a privileged fashion in Christ, who is called therefore the “mystery of God” . . . . For the same reason Sacred Scripture, the Church and the liturgical rites were designated by the first Christian generations by the term mystery, and by its Latin translation

sacrament. In the sacrament the salvific plan is fulfilled and revealed; that is, it is made present among humans and for humans. But at the same time, it is through the sacrament that humans encounter God. . . . The sacrament is thus the

efficacious revelation of the call to communion with God and to the unity of all humankind.231

Like Newbigin, although with less eschatological emphasis, Gutierrez locates the identity and calling of the church in relation to God‟s purpose of gathering all

humanity into one in community and fellowship in Christ. Gutierrez quotes several times from Lumen gentium and this gives some credence to the assertion of one periti (leading theologians who participated in the council) to Newbigin that his Household of God had influenced the writing of Lumen gentium.232

Newbigin and Gutierrez part company in their respective interpretations of the relationship between eschatology and the present. This difference highlights

rence]

227

G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, rev. ed. (London: SCM Press Ltd., 1988), xxx.

228 _{G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, 95.} 229 _{G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, xli.}

230 _{G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, 146. He describes this as “one of the most important and}

permanent contributions of the Council.”

231 _{G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, 146. References to the church as a sign of humanity‟s unity}

in Christ are scattered throughout the book, i.e.: “The promise of unity is at the heart of Christ‟s work; in him human beings are sons and daughters fo the Father and brothers and sisters to one another. The church, the community of those who confess Christ as their Lord, is a sign of unity within history (Constitution of the Church, 1)” (p.161).

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Newbigin‟s pessimism about the present realization of the kingdom, and the gap between his eschatology and the present. Gutierrez uses the attractive term

“eschatological promises” to point to the assurance of the in-breaking of eschatology in the present as “partial fulfillments through liberating historical events.”233

There is a present realization of the eschaton, but one that simultaneously opens the horizon towards the future. Gutierrez gives motivation for the rigorous and difficult work of liberative action in the present, on the grounds of the assurance that the “gift” of the kingdom can be received, in part, in the present. Newbigin suggests that Gutierrez is over optimistic about the in-breaking of the kingdom in history, failing to adequately reflect the New Testament‟s apocalyptic interpretation of history, and also fails to understand that God‟s reign is present in history under the sign of the cross.234

He writes of the facts of life, namely death, in particular, and the apparent triumph of evil over good, as contradicting the idea of the present realization of the kingdom – a criticism that will be considered in a little more detail in the next chapter.235

They also part company in terms of understanding mission. Gutierrez gave greater emphasis to mission in the form of political action than Newbigin, as Gutierrez wrote: “The eschatological vision becomes operative, when . . . ]it] gives rise to what has been called “political theology.””236

Newbigin agreed that political action is a responsibility of the church, as he states:

To work for the reformation of structures, to expose and attack unjust structures, and, when the point is reached at which all other means have failed, to work for the overthrow of an evil political and economic order is as much a part of the mission of the church as to care for the sick and to feed the hungry.237

The point of departure between Newbigin and Gutierrez in terms of mission is Gutierrez‟s emphasis on political action. This kind of activism, is for Newbigin, a part, “but not the whole” of the church‟s mission in the world.238

The mission of the church in relation to the realization of the kingdom of God on earth does not give priority to social and political activism. The role of the church as witness to the kingdom of God through the proclaimed word, as well as in its fellowship, is

233 _{G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, 96.} 234 _{L. Newbigin, The Open Secret, 101.} 235 _{L. Newbigin, The Open Secret, 103ff.} 236

G. Gutierrez, A Theology of Liberation, 126.

237 _{L. Newbigin, The Open Secret, 109.} 238 _{L. Newbigin, The Open Secret, 109.}

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necessary and legitimate action in relation to the end: evangelism and discipleship is a part of the church‟s mission in the world in relation to the kingdom of God.