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The Church as the image of God

The Church as the image of God . Image of God and Communion Ecclesiology. Introduction. Ecclesial communion should correspond to trinitarian communion Eastern Church

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The Church as the image of God

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  1. The Church as the image of God Image of God and Communion Ecclesiology

  2. Introduction • Ecclesial communion should correspond to trinitarian communion • Eastern Church • Timothy (Metropolitan Kallistos) Ware: In the Trinity the three are one God, yet each is fully personal; in the Church a multitude of human persons in mutual indwelling of the persons of the Trinity is paralleled by the coinherence of the members of the Church.” • Protestant Examples include MiroslavVolf’s, After Our Likeness: The Church as the Image of the Trinity and Stanley Grenz in our textbook, The Community of God • Trinitarian God is a community of persons, a community of love • See here John Zizioulas

  3. Limitations of human and divine correspondence • Three limits (see, e.g. , Volf article, Trinity is Our Social Program and Rob Muthiah, The Priesthood of All Believers) • We are limited by our creatureliness; we are created beings, while God is not • God is a mystery; all trinitarian language has anthropomorphic dimension and can never capture that mystery • Eschatological horizon: we are sinful beings on a journey towards the destination of what we will become; we are moving from our historical condition to an eschatological one • Similarly, as Rob Muthiah points out, the Church is dynamically moving towards our eschatological condition; only in the eschaton will the Church reach the fullness of its trinitarian correspondence • Be careful of human projection

  4. Ecclesiological Implications of Correspondence with Trinitarian Communion (Rob Muthiah)* • Relationality • Presence • Equality • Non-domination • Unity • Differentiation *The Priesthood of All Believers, 50.

  5. Communion Ecclesiologies

  6. Communion Ecclesiology • Living in communion with God and other Christians is essential part of Christian life • Speaks especially to our post-Enlightenment situation • Closely related to the reemergence of trinitarian theology • God as the model and source of community • Communion theology also related to the recognition of relationalityin secular disciplines • See, for example, Martin Buber: “I-Thou” • Rediscovery of Biblical and Patristic teaching on communion • Eastern Orthdoxy’s contribution • Communion Ecclesiology in the Roman Catholic church

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