Volume 09 Issue 2
Spring 2025 | 52 pages
Articles
Reformed Catholicity: Decennial Reflections
Michael Allen and Scott R. Swain
In late 2015, Reformed Catholicity: The Promise of Retrieval for Theology and Biblical Interpretation was published. We began that book with the lines: “We rejoice in the fact that this book is not suggesting a new path but is offering analysis of what we see occurring around us already. So we give thanks for friends... READ MORE
Reformed Catholicity as a Generative Theological Vision
J. Todd Billings
Michael Allen and Scott Swain’s Reformed Catholicity marked a turning point in the ongoing conversation about renewing a catholic and Reformed theological tradition, clarifying its doctrinal, ecclesial, and exegetical dimensions. As a theological program, Reformed catholicity has shown remarkable promise. Though I contributed the Afterword to Reformed Catholicity, my own work has since developed a... READ MORE
Reformed Catholicity in Trinitarian Perspective
Gerald Bray
Where is the church heading in the third millennium of Christianity? One thing is certain – nowadays no denomination can live as an island unto itself. Whether we like it or not, we are connected with each other, not least in our opposition to the forces of secularism, as well as other religions and ideologies,... READ MORE
Three Fresh Prompts for Practicing Reformed Catholicity
John V. Fesko
When I was early in my ministry, I was serving on the candidates and credentials committee of my presbytery and thus participated in numerous interviews of ministerial candidates and transfers. One of the common questions we asked was, “What types of theology books do you enjoy reading?” On one occasion a ministerial transfer retorted, “I... READ MORE
Theology in Context: A Reformed Catholic Vision for Anglicanism
Justin S. Holcomb
In a world increasingly marked by fragmentation and polarization, the church serves as a sign and witness of the unity given in Christ—grounded in the gospel and rooted in the historic faith. Reformed Catholicity offers the Anglican Communion a theological approach for maintaining this unity—retrieving its catholic heritage while remaining faithful to the biblical, Christ-centered,... READ MORE
The Existential Dimension of Reformed Catholicity
Christopher R. J. Holmes
I’m grateful for Allen’s and Swain’s fine book, Reformed Catholicity. I don’t have much to quibble with. My own life and ministry has been dedicated to promoting the “authority of apostolic Scripture . . . within the context of the apostolic church.” (1) With Allen and Swain, I agree, wholeheartedly, that “tradition is the church’s... READ MORE
Reformed Catholicity and the Need for Dogmatics Today
Michael Horton
The Evangelical Theological Society has contributed valiantly to the defense of biblical inerrancy and its members have produced impressive summaries. For the most part, though, evangelical systematic theology has been of the “catalogue-of-Bible-doctrine” variety. Moreover, there have been significant debates in ETS over elements of classical theism (even among conservative non-open-theists) as well as over... READ MORE
Reformed Catholicity: Challenge, Not Consumerism
Drew Martin
Approximately fifteen years ago, I attended a conference on historic Christian worship, hosted by a large church with a primarily academic audience of pastors and church leaders. The aim was to retrieve historic worship practices for the contemporary church. While I encountered many thoughtful presentations, one moment stands out. During lunch, a passionate congregant remarked... READ MORE
The Promise of Reformed Catholicity for Christian Ethics
Matthew Mason
Many of the most pressing challenges facing the church today are ethical in nature. New questions constantly arise in relation to technology, medical ethics, politics, social ethics, sexuality and gender, and much more. In such a situation, there is always a danger that Christian ethics reduces itself to somewhat frantic, anxious, and reactive modes of... READ MORE
A Journey, Personal and Institutional, Toward Theological Renewal
Jonathan Pennington
“All theology is autobiography,” the adage notes. My theological sensibilities and judgments are no exception. With what is certainly imperfect self-awareness of my own story, I’m thankful for the opportunity to engage in a reflection on the always-stimulating work of my friends’ manifesto, Reformed Catholicity. The tenth anniversary of this book providentially corresponds to my... READ MORE
Trinitarian Theology and Reformed Catholicity
Fred Sanders
With its programmatic outlook, its cross-disciplinary venturesomeness, and its broad, journalistic reportage of (then-) current trends in theology and church life, Allen and Swain’s little book Reformed Catholicity (2015) has a lot going on. Without denying the book’s explanatory helpfulness as a guide to the times, or its power as a manifesto for a movement... READ MORE
Reformed Catholicity and the Pastor: Virtues and Postures
Joey Sherrard
I remember vividly my first encounter with Allen and Swain’s Reformed Catholicity: it was during the final year of my doctoral program, on a train trip from Cambridge back to St. Andrews in midsummer. The volume had just been published, and upon the recommendation of some of my fellow postgraduates I’d picked up a copy... READ MORE
Catholicity Involves History and a Globe
Jonatán Simons
When I first read Reformed Catholicity (hereafter RC), it labelled something of which I felt a part, but had no idea formally existed in the Reformed world, not unlike a toddler who suddenly comes to realize that they have a middle name. It unveiled intentional efforts my professors, from various (mostly Protestant) institutions, had made... READ MORE
One Warning, Two Hopes
N. Gray Sutanto
It is hard to overestimate the influence of the slim but tightly argued manifesto, Reformed Catholicity, by my colleagues, Michael Allen and Scott Swain. As I suggested in a review of the work in 2016 for the Journal of Reformed Theology, they have succeeded in offering a distinctly Protestant case for theological retrieval that advances,... READ MORE
Teaching In, With, and Under the Christian Church
Douglas A. Sweeney
I’ve been working hard recently on a global history of doctrine and, while speaking and writing about its practical significance, thinking once again about what it means to catechize the faithful in families, congregations, and schools in communion with the saints (past and present, near and far). I oppose what some call “the right of... READ MORE
The Complexity of Divine Simplicity: A Test Case for Reformed Catholic Retrieval
Daniel J. Treier
Since “Reformed catholicity” began to emerge over the past two decades, several of my students have surfaced a practical question that impinges on catholicity: Can we approach earlier modern theologians like Søren Kierkegaard or Herman Bavinck in terms of “retrieval”? Or is that approach inherently oriented around pre-modern materials? Another practical question impinges on Reformed... READ MORE
Retrieval and the Center of (Reformed) Catholicity
Tyler R. Wittman
In their manifesto for Reformed catholicity, Mike Allen and Scott Swain pursue a distinctly Protestant way of inhabiting Christian tradition and its interpretive wisdom.[1] The project is one for which we should be grateful, since it embodies a theologically serious hope for catholicity rather than a wistful longing for unity on just any grounds. In... READ MORE
A Tin of Plaudits (and Three Challenges) for a Tenth Anniversary
Kevin J. Vanhoozer
The traditional tenth anniversary gift is tin. It’s an appropriate symbol. Tin is known for its durability and flexibility and used in solder for creating a permanent bond between pieces of metal that would otherwise be disconnected. So, I suggest, is the concept of Reformed catholicity, a notion that has connected past to present and... READ MORE