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THE CHURCH IS IN PELAGIAN CAPTIVITY!
By Chuck Collins
www.virtueonline.org
May 1, 2024
Pelagianism is the favorite heresy of evangelicals, from the moralism of the do-more and try-harder "celebration of the disciplines," to the Lordship Salvation movement (you need obedience to complete your salvation). Moral improvement is the pulpit proclamation of the day, and what God did and does for morally depraved individuals is on the back burner or not served at all.
On May 1, 418 over two hundred bishops meeting in Carthage declared Pelagius a heretic and refused to ordain Caelestius, Pelagius' disciple, when he would not renounce the teaching. Pelagius was a 5th century British monk. He was a rock-star because he was a good man who taught good people that they need to be better. He challenged Augustine, the bishop of Hippo, by promoting a sunnier picture of human nature. He taught that Adam's sin affected Adam only and that men and women are free to sin or to not sin. Pelagius opposed the idea of original sin: humans after the Fall are not able to not sin - until such time as God brings us from death to life and gives us the Holy Spirit and a "right willing." Pelagians then and today have a high anthropology (a confident view of "free will") which always results in a low christology (we don't need a Savior, we need a coach to cheer us on).
At the "Council of Africa" (as Augustine called it), the catholic church restated what the Bible clearly teaches about human nature and God's gracious provision in sending his Son. Christianity is not first about moral living or about our performance, but about a God who resurrects human beings who are spiritually dead in sin.
Anglicans are very clear that human nature after Adam and Eve's disobedience in the garden is in bondage to sin - that we are spiritually dead in our trespasses and sins and by nature children of wrath (Ephesians 2). We can't talk about God's grace, I mean we can't even fathom what it means, until we understand our human condition that requires such grace. "Original sin standeth not in the following of Adam, (as the Pelagians do vainly talk) but it is the fault and corruption of the Nature of every man" (Articles of Religion, IX). The Articles go on to say: "The condition of Man after the fall of Adam, is such, the he cannot turn and prepare himself, by his own natural strength and good works, to faith, and calling upon God" (Article X).
Anglicans are pleased to be reminded of this when we pray: "We do not presume to come to this thy table, O merciful Lord, trusting in our own righteousness, but in thy manifold and great mercies. We are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy table, but thou art the same Lord whose property is always to have mercy... "(Prayer of Humble Access)
