The Pharisees, on the other hand, agree with Jesus about eternal life; however, they see this not as a gift, but as what they have earned and deserve. Self-righteousness is the product of the Pharisee yeast. It feeds the self-centeredness that Jesus Christ came to heal.

"We who live in modern (and post-modern) times have traded our role with God's role. God is no longer the judge of us but we of him. We have arrogated to ourselves the attributes of deity and given to God the responsibility to justify himself, repent, change, or disappear as irrelevant."

Allison traces the yeast of secularism from society through to the churches. When it is found in the church, it represents Christianity to the world in a singularly unattractive and undesirable way.

The former Episcopal bishop blasts what he calls the current search for a "manageable deity" and the lamentable departure from Christianity in the training of American clergy. "Where the present-day hubris prevails, evangelism is a stillbirth. Churches thus corrupted become impotent to speak to the culture whose prevailing hope, amid the dissolution of therapeutic trust is that of inevitable progress."

Allison paints with a broad brush, willing to take on some of the sacred cows of evangelicalism. In a chapter titled "Anglican Pharisees" he takes on the early ministries of the Wesleys, William Law and others for imbibing "the universal thirst for self-righteousness." In a chapter on Roman Catholicism and the Council of Trent, Allison takes the gloves off. "The decrees of the Council of Trent about sin and justification are to Pharisaism as cigarettes are to cancer." Trent claimed that our present infused righteousness is in itself enough to satisfy God's almighty justice. This mistake was a breach in the air locks that guards the faith from resting on one's own goodness (which in this life remains imperfect).

The claim that our righteousness, given at baptism, satisfies the justice of God reduces that righteousness to include venial sins and it can be improved by doing good works over and above what is required by the Church is false, says Allison. "The Anglican Article XIV of the 39 Articles explicitly denies the possibility of works of supererogation. Article XI deals with our chronic unworthiness before the majesty of God. We are accounted righteous before God because of the righteousness of Christ being reckoned or worded to us. We are at the same time," says Allison, "both righteous and a sinner - simul justus et peccator. Our righteousness is imputed to us not infused."

Allison blasts Protestant Pharisaism found among Lutherans, Presbyterians, and Methodists offering this, "The Pharisaic system, so congenial to our basic nature, offers the false hope that we can by our wills do what is necessary to be saved. When we believe that by our wills we can have faith (evangelical Pharisaism), an inevitable condescension and antipathy to those who have not used their wills to accept Jesus as their savior results. Scolding people for not believing in Jesus is a symptom of the lie. The belief that by our wills we can gain sufficient knowledge and self-control to attain salvation (high-church Pharisaism) is also a symptom of the lie."

Allison writes, "The crucial answer to both the Pharisee, as well as the Sadducee, is the very person of Christ "impinging upon the self from without." Christ's sacrifice gives us access to the only true meeting of mercy and justice, without which humans ultimately can not know the love that begins to set them free to be whole and saved."

Bishop Allison's thesis is that we are not free. We are in bondage. We are selfish. Our natural tendency is to want the universe to revolve round us. It is only in Christ, and by submitting to Christ that we can be set free. It is only when we understand that those around us are not free but in bondage that we will begin to love as Christ loved us - knowing that people need Jesus - they need his love, his justice - his forgiveness.

This book is packed with a lifetime of learning, understanding and reflection. His own life reflects years of wisdom which comes from a deep relationship and love of Christ. He once conceded to this writer that he had loved the church more than he had the Lord of the Church. "I had to repent," he said. Virtueonline thoroughly, and without equivocation, recommends and endorses this latest volume from this scholarly and humble Anglican pastor. The book is liberating, compelling and ultimately freeing. Allison does not condemn, he draws us closer to the center...and that center is Christ himself.

Since his "retirement" as the XII Bishop of South Carolina, Bishop Allison has not been inactive. He has spoken at conferences in Toronto and Halifax, debated Bishop David Jenkins of Durham, England, in Richmond and Fredericksburg, Virginia. He has debated Bishop Paul Moore in Austin, Texas and Pennsylvania and debated Canon Walter Dennis in New York City and Bishop Fred Borsch at General Seminary. He published The Cruelty of Heresy in 1994, helped consecrate Bishop John Rodgers and Bishop Charles Murphy in Singapore for the Anglican Mission in the Americas, spoken at successive AMIA Winter Conferences, helped found "Scholarly Engagement in Anglican Doctrine"; and the yearly conference of "Mere Anglicanism" in Charleston, SC. He has taught at Sewanee (St. Luke's Seminary), Virginia Seminary, and General Seminary (homiletics) as well as lecturing at the Salisbury Theological College in England; American Canon of St. Andrew's Cathedral in Aberdeen, Scotland; has written essays in several books and articles for "Lutheran Forum" and "Modern Reformation."

His previous books include: The Rise of Moralism: The Proclamation of the Gospel from Hooker to Baxter, Epiphany by C. FitzSimons Allison and Werner H. Kelber; Guilt, Anger and God: The Patterns of Our Discontents; Fear, Love, and Worship, The Cruelty of Heresy: An Affirmation of Christian Orthodoxy.

To buy his latest book and any of his others go here: http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=ntt_athr_dp_sr_1?_encoding=UTF8&sort=relevancerank&search-alias=books&field-author=C.%20Fitzsimons%20Allison

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