The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett Jr., 1950–2015: Volume Six: The Roman Catholic Church

By James Leo Garrett, Jr., Steven R. Harmon and Jason G. Duesing

James Leo Garrett Jr. has been called "the last of the gentlemen theologians" and "the dean of Southern Baptist theologians." In The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett Jr., 1950-2015, the reader will find a truly dazzling collection of works that clearly evince the meticulous scholarship, the even-handed treatment, the biblical fidelity, the wide historical breadth, and the honest sincerity that have made the work and person of James Leo Garrett Jr. so esteemed and revered among so many for so long. Volume 6 contains Garrett's writings on Roman Catholicism, writings that arise from his own careful study of and interactions with the Catholic Church. Spanning sixty-five years and touching on topics from Baptist history, theology, ecclesiology, church history and biography, religious liberty, Roman Catholicism, and the Christian life, The Collected Writings of James Leo Garrett, Jr., 1950-2015 will inform and inspire readers regardless of their religious or denominational affiliations.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Resource Publications
• Release date: Sep 26, 2022
• ISBN: 9781532607455

James Leo Garrett, Jr.

James Leo Garrett Jr. is Distinguished Professor of Theology, Emeritus, at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. He is the author of a major two-volume work, Systematic Theology: Biblical, Historical, and Evangelical (Wipf & Stock, 2014), the monumental Baptist Theology: A Four-Century Study (2009), and numerous other books and articles. He currently lives in Nacogdoches, Texas.

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Preface

My encounters with James Leo Garrett Jr. ( 1925 – 2020 ) took place roughly 18 years ago whilst a new PhD student at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. I worked my way through my degree in an administrative office, and it was the office Dr. Garrett would call when he needed assistance with something important. Frequently, his calls to my desk concerned a certain exterior door in the lower level of Fleming Hall that he would access on his return from Roberts Library to his office. His office was a monument to his intensity and focus for it was one of the few of the internal offices in Fleming Hall without a window, which gave Dr. Garrett more room for books and closer proximity to Roberts Library. Thus, given that his hands were often full of books, he counted on the automatic door button to function to assist him in his navigation of the elements from one building to another—and when said door did not open, I received a very kind phone call to see if I could expedite its repair. We refer to Dr. Garrett as one of the last Gentlemen Theologians, and he was that in every brief interaction I had with him, but that door, I am not sure it received the same chivalry.

C. S. Lewis, in explaining his mere Christianity, conceived of the traditions of Christianity

like a hall out of which doors open into several rooms. If I can bring anyone into that hall I shall have done what I attempted. But it is in the rooms, not in the hall, that there are fires and chairs and meals. The hall is the place to wait in, a place from which to try the various doors, not a place to live in.¹¹

One of the best ways to read and understand what James Leo Garrett Jr. has done with his magna opera¹² is to see him as one standing at the door to a room marked The Baptist Tradition, holding the door open and beckoning you, as a friend, to enter. For in that room there are fires and chairs and meals. And Garrett doesn’t mind if you are not a Baptist! In fact, the more who would like to come in and have a look around and visit about Baptist theological perspectives, the better. For the subject matter of this volume, the Roman Catholic Church, this idea of Garrett as a Doorman for the Baptist Tradition best depicts his rich and full life of the scholarship here on display.

I never had Dr. Garrett as a professor. I came to Southwestern for my PhD studies right at the time he started his intensive reading for his Baptist Theology. I had read of the shirts students at Southwestern had made decades before, I survived Theo with Leo, and of his legacy as a lecturer as Machine-Gun Garrett. His peers recognized him as the most knowledgeable Baptist theologian living today.¹³ He was known, as the Christian Century noted, as the dean of Southern Baptist theologians.¹⁴ Garrett served as a mentor to my professor, Malcolm B. Yarnell III, and thus, early in my studies, I ventured to ask Dr. Garrett if he would guide me in a Directed Study PhD seminar covering the Baptist Theologians, thinking it would be ideal to study with him while he wrote that volume. My request landed on him like Sanballat and Gesham calling up to Nehemiah on the wall, and Dr. Garrett’s response was the same, I am doing a great work and cannot come down (Neh 6:3). Though that door of formal study with Dr. Garrett was closed, it led to my discovery of meaningful and longer-lasting ways that he would serve as a Door Opener for me to Baptist theology and scholarship.

On social media, in recent months, there was a trend of students tracing their intellectual family tree by tracing their professor’s professor, and their professor’s professors. Through Dr. Garrett’s student and my professor, Yarnell, I learned, not even realizing it at first, the Garrett method of methodical and careful scholarship, as well as receiving a challenging (and encouraging) push toward excellence in researching Baptist theology for the glory of God and his church—attributes also on display in this volume. In addition to the gift of his student as my professor, I would read his works. Indeed, having access to Garrett’s magna opera is better than having one seminar with him. Thus, through this indirect influence on me, a new generation of students are meeting James Leo Garrett Jr. and are finding him standing at the door of the room labeled The Baptist Tradition and beckoning them as friends to enter. For as C. S. Lewis said, in that room, there are fires and chairs and meals—good gifts of instruction and help for 21st century Baptists. With this volume of the Collected Writings now available, Dr. Garrett’s door still functions well and is open.

Jason G. Duesing

Professor of Historical Theology

Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary

11

. C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity, Preface.

12

. A Magnum Opus often is thought of as a pinnacle achievement, a comprehensive and exhaustive work of a lifetime, and the entry point as well as a definitive point for many students and scholars to reference and interact. However, Garrett has magna opera, the plural of magnum opus, for his Systematic Theology stands on its own as a life work of significant influence, his Baptist Theology stands alone, and now thanks to the labors of Wyman Lewis Richardson, this multi-volume Collected Writings project will stand as well among Garrett’s great works.

13

. Badsen, James Leo Garrett Jr.,

298

.

14

. Christian Century, James Leo Garrett Jr.

Editors’ Introduction

The passing of James Leo Garrett Jr. in February of 2020 marked the loss of a Baptist voice uniquely situated to comment upon the transitions in Catholic theology and ecclesiology occurring in the seminal years of 1962 – 65 and the Second Vatican Council. These pieces reflect the pre-, mid-, and post-Council reflections of a Baptist theologian who had the privilege of attending the final week of session four of Vatican Council II. As such, they bear historical significance on the question of Southern Baptist engagement and interactions with Roman Catholics. What is more, the careful reader may detect certain shifts in tone and style in the writings of Garrett on Roman Catholicism as they traverse these years. Not only his own maturation as a scholar, but insights gleaned from his deep engagement in ecumenical dialogues with Roman Catholics manifest themselves in interesting ways in these journal articles and book chapters. Above all else, these writings are a model of how one might hold to Baptist distinctives and convictions, even to the point of critiquing Roman Catholicism at a number of points, and yet do so with care and a refreshing absence of vitriol. It is difficult not to read these chapters and wonder if Southern Baptist engagement with those outside of our own ecclesial tradition could ever regain on a wide scale this type of constructive care and precision.

I (Wyman Richardson) would like to thank Lisa Kelley and Audra Murray for their assistance in typing a number of these chapters. What is more, Jill Botticelli, Southwestern Seminary archivist, has been a consistent source of help. I appreciate both Steve Harmon’s and Jason Duesing’s contributions to the front matter of this volume. Their voices on many of the issues raised in this volume are significant in their own right. The same can be said of Malcolm Yarnell, for whose encouragement I am also grateful. Eugene Curry did a tremendous job of editing and formatting this volume and I am grateful for his significant contribution. My mother, Diane Richardson, of Sumter, South Carolina, graciously agreed to proof this volume. Aaron Halstead, while working toward his PhD, took the time to read over the longest and most challenging chapters of this book and did yeoman’s work in proofing and making editorial suggestions. My thanks as well for the wonderful proofing assistance given by Jason Corn. The following members of Central Baptist Church in North Little Rock, AR, proofed various parts of the manuscript and I cannot thank them enough: Randal Ballew, Glennon Bobo, Andrew Brown, Travis Burns, Jeremy Caudill, Laura Caudill, Celeste Caudill, Eric Lancaster, Thomas Sewell, Coty Skinner, Greg Stafford, Luci Stephens, Jessica Wise, and Terry Wright. Bill Newton, Generations Pastor at First Baptist Hot Springs, AR, likewise offered valuable help with this volume, as did Tim Hawkins, pastor of Storied Church in Colorado Springs, CO. My thanks and love to my wife, Roni Richardson, and our daughter, Hannah, for their unflagging encouragement and positivity concerning this project!

Wyman Lewis Richardson

Pastor, Central Baptist Church

North Little Rock, Arkansas

When one hears the phrase historical theology, it is natural to think of certain seminal periods—e.g., the time of the Apostolic Fathers, the golden age of Scholasticism, the Reformation, etc. But, of course, history doesn’t come to an abrupt halt at some arbitrary point in the past; it continues up to the present, is contiguous with it. And in keeping with this, the discipline of historical theology rightfully covers the theological work done by all previous generations, including those only a step or two removed from our contemporaries. In this volume, one is given an opportunity to see how a thoughtful Southern Baptist of recent history related to the Roman Catholic Church over the course of his life. And through the example of this man, one is given a window into the larger shift in Baptist attitudes towards the Catholic Church as it underwent its own changes in the latter half of the twentieth century.

Thank you, Wyman, for inviting me to be a part of this project.

Eugene A. Curry

Pastor, Calvary Community Church

Longview, Washington

1

Why Not Marry a Catholic? (1950)

¹

The marriage of a Roman Catholic and a non-Roman Catholic is a matter of serious consequences at any time. Particularly is this true at the present when the Roman church is so vigorously employing matrimony as a method of propagating the Catholic religion. To manifest a concern or to warn of the dangers involved in such a marriage is more than an expression of a Protestant prejudice.

It is important to open the question of Catholic and non-Catholic marriage because of the commitments which the non-Catholic must necessarily make if the couple has a Catholic wedding. These commitments are well known to Roman Catholics, but non-Catholics as a whole are almost totally unaware of them, unless a relative or a friend has married a Roman Catholic. Surely it is time for Baptists to give a clear answer to the question, Why should I not marry a Catholic?

Matrimony a Sacrament

The Roman Catholic Church teaches that matrimony is one of the seven sacraments. While marriage was instituted in Adam’s day, according to the Roman view, Christ raised the institution to the dignity of a sacrament. Thus, matrimony is the sacrament by which baptized persons bind themselves for life in a lawful marriage and receive the grace to discharge their duties. However, the Catholic doctrine of matrimony does not mean, as Paul Blanshard has pointed out, that all marriages are sacred. Only since 1908 has the Pope recognized the validity of Protestant marriage, that is, the marriage of a Protestant to a Protestant under a Protestant or a civil ceremony. It is mixed marriage, that is, one involving a Catholic and a Protestant, which has caused the Roman church to wage war continuously.

A mixed marriage is not recognized by the Roman church as marriage until a dispensation for such a marriage has been granted, and unless the marriage ceremony is performed according to the rite of the Roman church, that is, performed by a priest. Ordinarily, the parish priest makes application to the bishop for a dispensation after both the Catholic party and the non-Catholic party have signed the ante-nuptial or pre-marital agreement. This is the alternative taken by the priest if he has failed to persuade the non-Catholic party to become a Catholic.

In some areas in America where non-Catholics predominate, the Roman church may not always enforce the signer of the ante-nuptial agreement by the non-Catholic party, if there is hope that the non-Catholic party may soon be won to Catholicism. Usually, the dispensation is granted by the American bishops without difficulty, although the Vatican deplores the increase of mixed marriages in America. The prevailing practice has been that no mixed marriage could be performed in the church proper. Recently Archbishop Cushing of Boston ruled that all marriages in his archdiocese, including even mixed marriages, must be celebrated in the church, not in a private home, rectory, or even sacristy of the church.

Living in Fornication

If the couple desiring a mixed marriage should not choose to have a Catholic ceremony, but instead should have a Protestant or civil ceremony, the Roman church regards this marriage as null and void. The church views these two as living in fornication, and any children born to them as illegitimate, even though their marriage is valid from the viewpoint of the state.

The couple has three possible alternatives at this point. First, they may repent, confess, and after a dispensation has been obtained, submit to the Catholic rite in the presence of the priest. If they do this, they are validly married in the eyes of the Roman church, and their children, if any, are declared legitimate. Secondly, they may separate and seek a civil divorce to nullify their non-Catholic marriage, and thus dissolve their newly founded home. In this event the Catholic party would, after confession, be in good standing with the Roman church. In the third place, the couple may repudiate Catholic authority, uphold their Protestant or civil marriage, and endure the excommunication of the Catholic party.

Because of the great difficulty of persuading a Catholic to break with the Roman Catholic Church, except when that person has had a vital experience of conversion to Christ as personal Savior, let us consider further the matter of marriage according to the Roman rite. What is involved in the ante-nuptial agreement?

The non-Catholic party must make four promises or commitment. First, he (or she) agrees to enter the marriage relation with the understanding that it is indissoluble, except by death. Secondly, he (or she) promises that he (or she) will not in any way hinder or obstruct the Catholic party in his (or her) exercises of the Catholic religion. The third promise is that all children of either sex born of our marriage shall be baptized and educated in the Catholic faith and according to the teachings of the Catholic Church, even if the Catholic party should die during the childhood of the children. Finally, the non-Catholic party promises to marry only according to the marriage rite of the Catholic Church and not to present himself (or herself) and the Catholic party for marriage before a civil magistrate or minister of the gospel, either before or after the Catholic ceremony.

Education of Children

The Catholic party makes three promises in the ante-nuptial agreement, two of which are the same as those made by the non-Catholic party. These are the promises concerning the baptism and education of all children in Catholic religion and concerning no civil or Protestant ceremony. The one additional promise made by the Catholic party is that he (or she) will do all in his power to bring about the conversion of the non-Catholic party to Catholicism.

It is an important matter, therefore, when a Baptist boy marries a Catholic girl, or vice versa. For the Baptist, the marriage carries with it the implication of a surrender to the authority of the true church. Submission to the rite of the Roman hierarchy is required; celebration of the marriage by the pastor of the Baptist fellowship is forbidden. For the Baptist, marriage to a Catholic, according to the Catholic rite, means that the Baptist promises to surrender forever the privilege of any direct effort to bring his wife or her husband to evangelical Christianity. At the same time, he enters into a relation in which his life companion, if faithful to her ante-nuptial agreement, will continue to press for his conversion to Catholicism. For the Baptist, such a marriage means that a home is to be founded on the basis of two religious loyalties which are diametrically opposed.

Is not this price too great for a Baptist who acknowledges Christ as the sovereign Lord, and who loves the New Testament faith?

1

. This article first appeared in Baptist Standard (July

20

,

1950

)

3

.

2

Outside the Church No Salvation (1958)

²

The Roman Catholic dogma which is summarized by the formula, Outside the church (there is) no salvation, is often misunderstood and misapplied. Such misinterpretation is often made by non-Catholics and likewise by Roman Catholic laymen. That such should be the case is not surprising for this historic teaching of the Roman church has itself undergone a modern reinterpretation.

Roman Catholics who are averse to a strict interpretation of this doctrine are quick to point out that the Roman Catholic Church distinguishes between the soul of the church and the body of the church and that some persons may be in the soul of the church and yet not in its body. On this basis, the Catholic layman can encourage his non-Catholic friend or neighbor and demonstrate his own tolerance by pointing to possible salvation for those who are sincerely ignorant that the Roman church is the true church. But the Catholic, whether layman or priest, is wrong if he should affirm that this more liberal doctrine has always been the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church. He will tend to affirm such because of his presupposition that the teaching of his church has never changed since the days of Peter and the apostles.

Strict, Historical Interpretation

Indeed, the ancient and medieval periods afford abundant evidence that the strict doctrine of Outside the church no salvation was the invariable teaching of the Western or Roman church. Cyprian in the third century affirmed that to have the one God for your Father you must have the church for your mother by baptismal regeneration. Cyprian coined the phrase, Outside the church no salvation (extra ecclesiam nulla salus). The so-called Athanasian creed, which is accepted by the Roman church, declared, Whosoever wishes to be saved, before all things, it is necessary that he hold the Catholic faith. The Fourth Lateran Council (1214 AD) adopted the formula, extra ecclesiam nulla salus, and made transubstantiation, or the change of substance from bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus Christ, an essential mark of the true church.

Pope Boniface VIII in his famous bull Unam Sanctum (1302 AD) proclaimed to every human creature that they (sic) by necessity for salvation are entirely subject to the Roman Pontiff. Pope Eugenius IV, following the Council of Florence (1441 AD), declared that those not living within the Catholic church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, cannot become participants in eternal life but will depart ‘into everlasting fire.’ These and other similar quotations may be found in the monumental book by Henry Denziger, The Sources of Catholic Dogma. The Roman church held out no hope for the salvation of Cathars or Waldenses as well as none for Jews or Moslems.

Recent Liberal Interpretation

One must come to the nineteenth and twentieth centuries before finding any clear expression of the more liberal Catholic doctrine with its distinction between the soul and the body of the church. Augustine indeed had said that, since the church is the body of Christ, the Holy Spirit is the soul of the church, but this was a different idea. Pope Pius IX, who otherwise was quite reactionary to modern ideas, affirmed in an encyclical in 1863 that they who labor in invincible ignorance of our most holy religion and who, zealously keeping the natural law . . . and being ready to obey God, live an honest and upright life, can, by the operating power of divine light and grace, attain eternal life. On the contrary, said Pius IX, those who are obstinate toward the authority of the Roman church and persistently separate themselves from the unity of the Roman church cannot obtain eternal salvation.

Along with the distinction between the soul and the body of the church and the concept of invincible ignorance, there is the teaching of the baptism of desire. One has only to read a standard Roman Catholic catechism, such as the Baltimore Catechism used in this country, to discover that there are two exceptions to the absolute necessity of water baptism for regeneration, according to Roman teaching. One of these is the baptism of blood or martyrdom and the other is the so-called baptism of desire. Historically, it had been believed that a catechumen, or one being instructed in the Catholic faith, who died before receiving water baptism would not be required to have water baptism to be regenerated. The baptism of desire expands this possibility to others who may not actually be catechumens.

In recent years, the evidence of the prevalence of the liberal doctrine of Outside the church no salvation has increased, especially in nations traditionally Protestant. Professor Karl Adam, the Catholic theologian of the University of Tübingen in Germany, taught the liberal doctrine in his The Spirit of Catholicism (1935) and endorsed the distinction between a formal heretic and a material heretic. The former is one who deliberately and fully rejects the Roman Catholic Church and its teaching, while the latter is one who rejects and does not embrace the Roman church because of lack of knowledge or false prejudice.

Pope Pius XII himself in his letter On the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ (1934) differentiated between those actually incorporated in the Roman church and those united to her only by desire. Such desire, however, must be animated by perfect charity, and such persons cannot he secure of their own eternal salvation and are deprived of those many great and heavenly gifts and aids which can be enjoyed only in the Catholic church. Furthermore, the Boston heresy case of 1949–50 is added evidence of the same trend. In this instance Leonard Feeney, a Jesuit priest, was disciplined and excommunicated for pronouncedly and insistently teaching the strict doctrine of Outside the church no salvation with no exceptions. The Jesuit order, the Archbishop of Boston, the Congregation of the Holy Office in Rome, and even Pope Pius XII participated in this decision.

Evangelical Interpretation

This historic Roman Catholic dogma is being liberalized. How far this trend will go cannot now be ascertained. The liberal version has not been proclaimed a dogma by any pope, but neither have the rosary and the divine daughterhood of Mary been dogmatized! So long as Outside the church no salvation is institutionalized and made exclusive by the Roman church, this formula cannot be harmonized with the New Testament. Outside the church no salvation must rightly be construed as a corollary to Outside Jesus Christ no salvation (Acts 4:12). F. D. E. Schleiermacher was right when he said that the basic difference between Roman Catholicism and Protestantism was that in Catholicism one comes to Christ through the church, while in Protestantism one comes to the church through Christ. This is even more apt when we contrast our Baptist position with Roman Catholicism.

If we are truly Christ’s by grace through faith, then we belong to His holy fellowship. If we are truly Christ’s, we can say with Paul that we are members of the body of Christ (1 Cor 12:27), we can say with Peter that we are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people (1 Pet 2:9 RSV), and we can say with the seventeenth-century English Baptists that we are visible saints. If we are truly Christ’s, we now have eternal life (1 John 5:13) and now have the hope of final salvation (1 Pet 1:3–5). Such life and hope is from God through Christ and can never be taken away by any man who has occupied, who is occupying, or who shall occupy the See of Rome! Thanks be unto God!

2

. This article first appeared in Baptist Standard (September

10

,

1958

)

6

–

7

.

3

Basic Theological Differences (1960)

³

Certainly no one can approach a task of this magnitude without a feeling of inadequacy. I think that our panel members on basic differences are agreed on one thing, maybe on many things, but certainly that the task of clarifying and stating the basic differences between Roman Catholicism and Protestant or Evangelical Christianity is not a five-minute task. Despite various classic utterances about the basic differences between Protestantism and Rome, we cannot simply resolve the issue, we believe, in one simple answer, though we recognize some of the classic distinctions at this point. For instance, we have the option of taking from the Council of Trent itself the key for the basic difference between the Roman and Protestant position on the question of authority—that of the Bible, the Scriptures, versus the Scripture and traditions. We remember also the dictum of Schleiermacher, who said that in the Roman Catholic Church one comes to Christ through the church, whereas in Protestantism one comes to the church through Jesus Christ. The importance of the doctrine of the church in defining such distinctives has been recently recognized by Geddes MacGregor in his study Corpus Christi in which he says that rather than justification by grace through faith, the doctrine of the church was the key issue of the 16 th century. We will not forget that which has been given as the material principle of the Reformation, the issue of justification.

I. The Complexity of the Task

But when we come to face our problem in this evening session and tomorrow morning’s panel, we realize the complexity of the task that lies before us. Let me state some of the reasons for the complexity of our task.

First, there is the fact of the historical development of the Roman Catholic theological system itself, a development which is not adequately recognized by the Roman Catholic Church itself. Thus, we need to take into account the historic background of our subject, but we recognize at the same time that our basic question is not What did Augustine teach? nor What did Thomas Aquinas say? Our task is to study the post-Tridentine Roman theology, but even this theology lacks the essentials of a clear definition of the Immaculate Conception of Mary, Papal Infallibility, and the Assumption of Mary. We are familiar with the fact that since 1870 Roman Catholic historians and theologians have had to reassess the Popes, the Councils, and the theologians of the past centuries in the light of Papal Infallibility. Our concern then is primarily with contemporary Roman Catholic theology, or the theology of the contemporary Roman Catholic Church.

A second reason for the complexity of our task is the fact of persisting theological differences within the Roman Catholic Church on numerous issues not fully defined by the Roman Catholic Church. Perhaps the classic examples of this are the theological tendencies of the various religious orders: the fact that the Dominicans, for instance, do not agree with Jesuits and Franciscans on many basic theological questions, the fact that you can have a divergence in the Roman church on grace and free will, on the purpose of the incarnation of Christ in relation to human sin—even the possibility of an ex opera operantis approach to the sacraments in addition to the standard ex opera operato. We find even in the realm of religious freedom and church-state relations some new concepts being espoused by twentieth-century Catholic leaders, and these must be evaluated in the light of papal teaching. We face also that very present problem of realizing always the vast gulf that can exist between piety and dogma. When we talk about Roman Catholic theology, we must never become so abstract and so enamored with systems or dogma that we fail to recognize the pulse beat of Catholic piety.

Thus, we come to a third of these reasons