I think I see a clash here between a way of thinking about ethics that presupposes it to be about universal application (which is the normal way of thinking about ethics), and a particularist ethics that seeks to work out how the church is to behave as the vanguard of the eschaton. I assumed that Brandon was speaking only to the latter.

Christian ethics is normative only to the extent that it prefigures and participates in the life of the age to come. To the extent that such an age has not come in fulness, there will always be the world, against which the church defines itself and for which the church exists (in both cases, this is because the church wages war against the principalities and powers to which the world is held captive; it does so by embodying the alternative).

The world might learn from the church, which bears witness to the reign of God, but it cannot fully embrace the church's ethics or calling without becoming the church (which would not be such a bad thing, but is not likely to happen).

By the same token, the church cannot undertake actions that are necessary for the world without becoming the world, or becoming problematically of the world — which is to say, becoming (or remaining) captive to the very powers against which it should be fighting.

I think I see a clash here between a way of thinking about ethics that presupposes it to be about universal application (which is the normal way of thinking about ethics), and a particularist ethics that seeks to work out how the church is to behave as the vanguard of the eschaton. I assumed that Brandon was speaking only to the latter.

Christian ethics is normative only to the extent that it prefigures and participates in the life of the age to come. To the extent that such an age has not come in fulness, there will always be the world, against which the church defines itself and for which the church exists (in both cases, this is because the church wages war against the principalities and powers to which the world is held captive; it does so by embodying the alternative).

The world might learn from the church, which bears witness to the reign of God, but it cannot fully embrace the church’s ethics or calling without becoming the church (which would not be such a bad thing, but is not likely to happen).

By the same token, the church cannot undertake actions that are necessary for the world without becoming the world, or becoming problematically of the world — which is to say, becoming (or remaining) captive to the very powers against which it should be fighting.

I think I see a clash here between a way of thinking about ethics that presupposes it to be about universal application (which is the normal way of thinking about ethics), and a particularist ethics that seeks to work out how the church is to behave as the vanguard of the eschaton. I assumed that Brandon was speaking only to the latter.

Christian ethics is normative only to the extent that it prefigures and participates in the life of the age to come. To the extent that such an age has not come in fulness, there will always be the world, against which the church defines itself and for which the church exists (in both cases, this is because the church wages war against the principalities and powers to which the world is held captive; it does so by embodying the alternative).

The world might learn from the church, which bears witness to the reign of God, but it cannot fully embrace the church's ethics or calling without becoming the church (which would not be such a bad thing, but is not likely to happen).

By the same token, the church cannot undertake actions that are necessary for the world without becoming the world, or becoming problematically of the world — which is to say, becoming (or remaining) captive to the very powers against which it should be fighting.

I think I see a clash here between a way of thinking about ethics that presupposes it to be about universal application (which is the normal way of thinking about ethics), and a particularist ethics that seeks to work out how the church is to behave as the vanguard of the eschaton. I assumed that Brandon was speaking only to the latter.

Christian ethics is normative only to the extent that it prefigures and participates in the life of the age to come. To the extent that such an age has not come in fulness, there will always be the world, against which the church defines itself and for which the church exists (in both cases, this is because the church wages war against the principalities and powers to which the world is held captive; it does so by embodying the alternative).

The world might learn from the church, which bears witness to the reign of God, but it cannot fully embrace the church's ethics or calling without becoming the church (which would not be such a bad thing, but is not likely to happen).

By the same token, the church cannot undertake actions that are necessary for the world without becoming the world, or becoming problematically of the world — which is to say, becoming (or remaining) captive to the very powers against which it should be fighting.

I think I see a clash here between a way of thinking about ethics that presupposes it to be about universal application (which is the normal way of thinking about ethics), and a particularist ethics that seeks to work out how the church is to behave as the vanguard of the eschaton. I assumed that Brandon was speaking only to the latter.

Christian ethics is normative only to the extent that it prefigures and participates in the life of the age to come. To the extent that such an age has not come in fulness, there will always be the world, against which the church defines itself and for which the church exists (in both cases, this is because the church wages war against the principalities and powers to which the world is held captive; it does so by embodying the alternative).

The world might learn from the church, which bears witness to the reign of God, but it cannot fully embrace the church's ethics or calling without becoming the church (which would not be such a bad thing, but is not likely to happen).

By the same token, the church cannot undertake actions that are necessary for the world without becoming the world, or becoming problematically of the world — which is to say, becoming (or remaining) captive to the very powers against which it should be fighting.

I think I see a clash here between a way of thinking about ethics that presupposes it to be about universal application (which is the normal way of thinking about ethics), and a particularist ethics that seeks to work out how the church is to behave as the vanguard of the eschaton. I assumed that Brandon was speaking only to the latter.

Christian ethics is normative only to the extent that it prefigures and participates in the life of the age to come. To the extent that such an age has not come in fulness, there will always be the world, against which the church defines itself and for which the church exists (in both cases, this is because the church wages war against the principalities and powers to which the world is held captive; it does so by embodying the alternative).

The world might learn from the church, which bears witness to the reign of God, but it cannot fully embrace the church's ethics or calling without becoming the church (which would not be such a bad thing, but is not likely to happen).

By the same token, the church cannot undertake actions that are necessary for the world without becoming the world, or becoming problematically of the world — which is to say, becoming (or remaining) captive to the very powers against which it should be fighting.