Conciliarism A History of Decision-Making in the Church

Conciliarism is one of the oldest and most essential means of decision-making in the history of the Christian church. Indeed, as a leading Orthodox theologian Alexander Schmemann states, 'Before we understand the place and the function of the council in the church, we must, therefore, see the church herself as a council.' Paul Valliere tells the story of councils and conciliar decision-making in the Christian church from earliest times to the present. Drawing extensively upon the scholarship on conciliarism which has appeared in the last half-century, Valliere brings a broad ecumenical perspective to the study and shows how the conciliar tradition of the Christian past can serve as a resource for resolving conflicts in the church today. The book presents a conciliarism which involves historical legacy, but which leads us forward, not backward, and which keeps the church's collective eyes on the prize - the eschatological kingdom of God.

Introduction; 1. The conciliar testament; 2. The conciliar tradition; 3. The conciliar theory; 4. Conciliarism in Anglican experience; 5. The Pan-Anglican Council; Conclusion; Bibliography.

Paul Valliere is Professor of Religion and McGregor Professor in the Humanities at Butler University, Indianapolis, Indiana. He is the author of Holy War and Pentecostal Peace (1983), Change and Tradition in Russian Civilization (1995), Modern Russian Theology: Bukharev, Soloviev, Bulgakov (2000) and editor and translator of Finding God in a Tangled World: Thoughts and Parables (with Juris Rubenis and Maris Subacs, 2007).