Church Matters: Retrieving the Great Tradition

Ses s i on 6: Shared Sp i r i tua l i t y and Chur ch P l ant Movement s 119

that these men should be very perfect and blameless in all things, whom also they were leaving behind as their successors, delivering up their own place of government to these men.

~ Irenaeus (circa 180, E/W), 1.415. (David W. Bercot, ed. A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs . Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1998, pp. 415).

A. They establish simple structures to understand, defend, and embody in their worship and theology the apostolic doctrine of the Great Tradition.

1. They know and defend the primacy of Scripture in outlining the acts of God in history, culminating in Jesus Christ.

2. They understand and embrace the principle of apostolicity , affirming the Nicene’s emphasis on the centrality of the apostles’ witness in Christian doctrine and practice.

3. They connect themselves explicitly with the ancient Church , affirming that everything for faith and practice has once for all been delivered to the saints through the apostles, and articulated and guarded by the Church.

B. They embody Christ-centered spirituality rooted in the Great Tradition.

1. They affirm the role of the Church gathering for the Word and the Table .

2. They embrace the baptized life, grounded in the preparation of a Catechumanate , that leads to a life of discipleship lived in the community of a local assembly of believers.