For that reason I would have no objections to fellowshiping or even sharing a pulpit with at any of the Reformed and Protestant denominations out there, and after reading their orginal Articles I feel the same about Anglicans that still hold to those articles.

I’ve had Salvation Army, Methodist, Southern Methodist, and Pentecostal all preach at my church.

It is deeply troubling to me that one of Jesus last prayers on earth was for the oneness of his church. As such, I would think it to carry added weight and significance. And yet I’ve never heard a sermon, nor even read anything dedicated to fleshing out the meaning of this prayer. On the other hand, there is no end to all the sermons and arguments I’ve come across defending the holiness of all our divisions from and against one another. How can God not weep at our arrogance and hardness of heart?

If all of us here were to believe that in Christ we are one, what would this mean for the way we think, speak, and act? If we are truly, no matter our tradition, together the body of Christ, and we were actually to see ourselves in this way, would anything in creation be more wondrous and magnificent? Imagine Christ moving through the world with a body that is one not only in a spiritual and ethereal sense, but men and women of all creeds and cultures that see Christ in each other and so live toward one another accordingly.

As “unrealistic” and improbable as this vision is, can any of you argue that it is not what we are called to live for?

I appreciate much that you have written over the years, though I have not always agreed with you. Regarding denominationalism and the church, may I suggest the following.

Rethink the following from a Gospel perspective rather than from a post Epistle perspective.
1) Jesus Who is called The Christ.
2) The Church.
3) Church government. (Matt. 20 + 23)
4) Praise and Worship.
5) The Lord’s Supper and Baptism.
6) Saving faith.
7) Christian fellowship.
The law and the image of God in humankind.
9) etc.
It seems to me that the average believer (?) has forgotten the essence of all of the above, resulting in a church that Worships a God Whom they do not know, in ways not prescribed in Scripture, with fellowships/churches that do not conform to the teachings of Jesus Christ. To fully explain would take hundreds of pages.

I think it’s fair to go back to the sources and ask whether when we speak of “one, holy, catholic, and apostolic,” if we mean the same thing as those who composed and arranged those modifiers together.

I embrace wholeheartedly the central insight here.

I’m reminded of what Soloviev in his “Tale of the Antichrist” describes as the cry of all truly Christian ecumenism: “You give us everything, except what interests us, Jesus Christ.”

I was with your foxhole ecumenism in high school, not literally, but yes, I do remember a certain lived unity in Christ with Baptists and others.

It is realistic to note that Christians not only have different discourses, but also different experiences, different ontologies. As a Catholic, I don’t want to set myself in judgment above the people whom I experience as the Word-made-flesh, but I do embrace as true brothers and sisters all those who cry, “you give us everything, except what interests us, Jesus Christ.”