“It was really hard for me to stay Protestant”: On Retrievalism and the Gospel

Just last week, theologian Matthew Barrett announced that he is now an Anglican. Known as a Baptist, Barrett has embraced Anglican doctrine and ecclesiology. His departure from the Southern Baptist Convention is noteworthy, for Barrett became an outspoken proponent of a theological camp in recent years: “retrievalism.”

In the essay below, I will share a related—and noteworthy—matter. It is a previously-untold story (among Baptists and evangelicals, at least) of a young seminarian who attended the seminary at which Barrett taught, was introduced to the patristics in a theology class, and converted to Roman Catholicism. This story, I believe, directs us to ask thoughtful questions about the retrievalist paradigm.

Here is one we must ask: Does the retrievalist system lead some Baptist and evangelical students to leave the Baptist and evangelical movement? Few have posed such a query in recent days, even as retrievalism has been widely and enthusiastically promoted among Baptists and evangelicals. Yet this unique moment presses us to consider this question, and with urgency at that.

I should state several matters up front: 1) I want good for Matthew Barrett, and pray that for him, as well as for the student who converted to Roman Catholicism; 2) I have no quarrel with many godly administrators and faculty members at my previous seminary in Kansas City, a school for which I give thanks to God; 3) nor do I have any quarrel with Anglicanism or the ACNA, as I have personally benefited from the Anglican movement in many ways, learning much from over the years from figures like J. I. Packer, John Stott, J. C. Ryle, and many others; 4) as stated, my purpose in what follows is not to win a battle with any given person, but to think in public about matters of public teaching and public record.

What Is Retrievalism?

I now focus our attention on what is called “retrievalism.” In this system, one “retrieves” the wisdom of the Christian past by focusing on the hermeneutic and doctrine of past generations. This usually means an emphasis on the early church and the medieval church, which are seen as under-studied and under-appreciated in evangelical circles.

In reality, there is more going on in this conversation than it appears. The role of historical theology in doctrinal and spiritual formation is front and center in the retrievalist case. On this subject, there are at least four loosely-cohering positions that I see. Here they are:

Historical Theology is Unimportant: this would fit the No Creed But the Bible camp, though this group is very small in number these days. It emphasizes that the creeds and confessions are not a meaningful part of Christian formation; beyond this, church history itself is largely ignorable, outside of the few figures or churches that agree with one’s own doctrine.

Historical Theology is Important and Valuable: those of this camp highly value the church’s views and wisdom. In the seminary classroom and church teaching contexts, they honor the insights of creeds and confessions, giving formational pride of place to the conciliar parameters of the four ecumenical councils in particular. They read theologians across denominations and the ages, finding meaningful unity with all who love the Word and gospel.

But they do not view the church’s creeds and confessions as inerrant, they have occasional points of difference with certain formulations in historical theology, and they emphasize the necessity of biblical sufficiency in theological method. Historical theology is thus a valuable doctrine-framer, conversational partner, and witness. In spiritual life and doctrinal formation, however, historical theology is a servant (an extremely valuable one), but never our master.

Historical Theology is Very Important and Decisive: Adherents profess their love of major creeds and confessions, viewing them as guardrails in framing doctrine—a secondary authority, yes, but a trustworthy one. Where the councils of history have spoken, the church’s theology is largely settled. Disagreement with key confessional documents is possible, but closely guarded.

The aforementioned confessional documents are very closely aligned with the group’s identity, and the group’s identity is often described in terms of the confession it holds. In more recent years, the fourth group—sketched below—has exerted a good bit of influence on this third group, urging it to embrace the retrievalist vision of the dogmatic synthesis between the early and medieval church. It is not immediately clear how this trend will play out.

Historical Theology is Determinative in Doctrinal Formation: this is the retrievalist position. Not every adherent holds it in the same way or to the same degree of intensity, of course; some are more charitable than others. Nonetheless, the strong edge of this Protestant camp argues that the ecumenical councils and creeds are definitive beyond a shadow of a doubt.

This is a strikingly similar vision of the creeds and councils to the Catholic position. For the strongest edge of Protestant retrievalists, no deviations from creedal formulations are allowable. If a council or creed has spoken to issues like the will of God, or the descent of Christ into hell—issues that require a great deal of interpretive care—the position is settled.

Some retrievalists—though not all—go further, in fact. They claim that creedal documents should be treated as inerrant. This is an error, and a consequential one; while many documents are error-proof, inerrancy depends on ontology. Scripture is the only God-breathed book or document per 2 Timothy 3:16, and so the autographs of Scripture alone are inerrant.

So too is there a glorious synthesis between the early and medieval church. This synthesis includes the creeds and the theological insights of Athanasius, Augustine, Anselm, and Aquinas. Aquinas is viewed by many retrievalists as the doctrinal formulator par excellence. In his writings, the harvest of theology proper (and other doctrinal loci) over the centuries reaches its zenith.

Over the last few years, it has been strange to see the leading theologian of the Catholic tradition be touted as the greatest theologian of the Protestant tradition. Aquinas thought well about a number of ethical areas and can be read with profit in some respects. But Aquinas should be handled with great care, for as I have written elsewhere, he is the key standardizer of the sacramental theology of Catholicism, a system of soteriology in irreconcilable conflict with biblical justification and biblical sanctification as recovered by the Reformers.

The Debate Over Retrievalism Is a Debate Over Method

As I am at pains to say, the conversation over retrievalism is not simply a conversation over doctrine. It is first and foremost a conversation over method. We see the importance of method in Barrett’s Substack essay. In it, Barrett cites distaste for Southern Baptist politics, a newfound love of Anglican liturgy, and enjoyment of the warm fellowship of his local Anglican Church as key factors in his conversion. Yet it is his rationale for embracing paedobaptism that most caught my eye:

After noticing it could not account for the whole canon, I also had to ask myself, “Was the entire church wrong to baptize the children of believers for a millennium and a half? Was believer’s baptism taught by the apostles only to disappear under the supervision of the greatest theologians of the church, and then reappear for the first time in sixteenth century?” For someone serious about catholicity, that pill was too big to swallow.

Tucked into a single paragraph about baptism, this is an extremely important statement. This is, in a nutshell, a key Catholic argument against Protestantism. It is not a small or glancing charge. Before the ink dried on Luther’s famous theses, Calvin’s Institutes, and Zwingli’s own theses, Catholic theologians had mounted their most significant accusation against the Reformers: their doctrine was novel.

We should not discount the weight of this approach to doctrine. The Catholic Church wielded this weapon of accusation against the Reformational recovery of the authority of Scripture and the legal and God-enacted nature of justification by faith alone. The church had a consensus forged over 1,500 years or so; how could any lone individual break with such iron-strong unity of thought?

In Barrett’s essay, we see this most Catholic of arguments appear—strangely—once more. In truth, the Reformers were right to break with Rome in numerous respects. They rejected medieval soteriology, medieval bibliology, and different elements of medieval ecclesiology (to say nothing of numerous other areas). But the fundamental break came before these developments. The Reformers broke with Rome over method.

It was not enough to have a historical consensus, and police it. The Reformers recognized that Rome was not authoritative over the mind and the conscience. The Word of Christ alone was authoritative over the mind and the conscience. This did not mean that historical consensus was of no account for the Reformers; it did mean that historical theology was not on par with Scripture in doctrinal formation. From this hermeneutical and methodological conviction came the movement we call Protestantism.

One Student’s Testimony: “it was really hard for me to stay Protestant”

Let’s fast forward to today. As promoted by some, retrievalism has softened the clear lines drawn by the Reformers. It has not only done so in theoretical terms, though, in classroom debates. Retrievalism has passed into action. It is inescapable that this is so; ideas, after all, don’t stay theoretical for long. What is taught in a classroom eventually crosses over into everyday life.

As some students process retrievalist ideas and sources, they find themselves drawn toward the high church—and even Roman Catholicism itself. In what follows, I will retrace one such real-life example. It is the narrative of a young man named Jeremiah Zimmerman. Raised in the Assemblies of God, he entered seminary in the summer of 2021, and posted this photo on his Instagram account.

At this stage, Zimmerman articulated clear evidence of evangelical convictions. His Instagram account leaves this in no doubt. Less than two years later, though, Zimmerman was—by his own public testimony—received into the Catholic Church. Here’s the photo he posted of that event:

Zimmerman’s change was no small thing. He was interviewed by the Southern Nebraska Register, a Catholic periodical, about his newfound Catholic convictions. Here is how the article about Zimmerman described his shift:

He found solace in the Protestant faith’s scriptural foundation and intellectual depth. His passionate interest in scripture and theology led friends and pastors to encourage him to become a pastor himself.

However, Zimmerman’s spiritual journey took an unexpected turn when he delved into the writings of the early Church fathers. The ancient texts held profound insights that challenged his existing theological framework. One figure who captured Zimmerman’s attention was St. Athanasius, particularly his writings on the Incarnation.

While studying at the Midwest Baptist Theological Seminary in Kansas City, Zimmerman questioned his Protestant identity as he immersed himself in deeper theological investigations.

In a podcast interview with Zimmerman about his conversion to Catholicism, it was noteworthy to me that he cited the issue of baptism as the “catalyst” for his newfound convictions. He also referenced the reading he did as a gateway to Catholicism:

Actually, at the school I was at, the Baptist seminary, we were reading the patristic fathers like St. Gregory of Nazianzus, St. Cyril of Alexandria, St. Athanasius of Alexandria, St. Augustine, and we were reading scholastics like St. Anselm, St. Thomas Aquinas, and the more and more I read them, it was really hard for me to stay Protestant. At that point I knew I couldn’t be Protestant anymore, because if I were to stay Protestant, I would have to be in a very very specific traditional group that is almost so small that it’s self-defeating in the sense of its catholicity…

Zimmerman’s encounter with the patristics “in my theology course down at the Baptist seminary” had a landmark effect on him (he cited Athanasius’s work on the incarnation as a powerful influence). But not only him. Zimmerman went on to say this: “I’m not the only one from that school who’s converting. There are others who are also in the process of converting [to Catholicism]” at his former school, a claim I cannot prove or disprove.

How Should We Handle These Developments?

The preceding matters lead me to eight reflections. I will list them out here in rapid-fire fashion.

First, we should carefully evaluate retrievalism. It is not a foolproof system. It is eminently possible to embrace the retrievalist method and follow it to High Church Anglicanism or Rome. It is very clear once more (as in days past) that retrievalism affects different people in different ways, leading some to leave the Baptist world, and others to leave Protestantism entirely.

Second, we should anchor students in the Word. Instead of training students to follow us, trusting our preferred tribe, we do well to train them to follow the voice of God in Scripture (Psalm 119:97). This means, as I have said, modeling for students a genuinely exegetically-driven method. Close exegesis of Scripture builds our theology, leading to biblical-theological conclusions, systematic beliefs, scriptural ethics, and a worldview of the Word.

Third, we should approach historical theology with great care. Historical theology is of serious value. I do not merely state this; I have published books like this one that deal with historical theology directly. I have taught numerous classes in church history and historical theology, including the full range of church history, Baptist history, and neo-evangelical history. This area of formation is vital.

But historical theology must give way to exegetical theology as king of the disciplines. This is not only about the doctrine we hold, though; it is about our method (to re-scratch the record once more). We bring historical theology and church history into the doctrinal formation room with us, absolutely.

Yet we cannot fail to be crystal-clear on this count: the reason we hold a given theological position should not be because a creed addresses it. The reason we hold a given theological position should ultimately always be because the Word of God—as best we can track it—compels us to take it. God’s Word alone binds the conscience; God’s revelation alone teaches us divine truth; God’s Word alone has pride of place in theological and spiritual formation.

No historical source, no school of historical theology, and no treasured theologian can be allowed to displace the Bible from its authoritative role as the rule of our doctrine. This is, quite simply, a line in the sand.

Fourth, we should steer clear of ecumenism and guard the gospel. I need not belabor this matter, but it is non-negotiable. If we do not “guard the good deposit” (2 Timothy 1:13-14), all our labors will ultimately be in vain. Can we read some theologians from the Catholic tradition? On certain questions, we can. But should we always do so carefully? Yes, we should. After all, if we are Nicene to the core but do not teach sola fide based on solus Christus, we will not guard the gospel, nor will we honor the God who gave it to us for safe-keeping.

Fifth, we should cultivate humility, charity, and honor. Aside from our hermeneutic and formal doctrine, we must not make the mistake of failing to cultivate godly character. Doctrine cannot be separated from personal piety (which cannot be separated from the gospel and its effects), we remember.

We may have correct convictions (or not), but the Christian faith does not terminate with the signing of a sheet of paper with beliefs sketched out on it. The Christian faith bears down on the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22-23), as doctrine is meant for joy, and truth-seeking is meant for worship.

Sixth, we should recognize numerous ironies of the retrievalist system. Toward that end, let me quickly chart a number of them with regard to the “retrievalist” emphasis of Barrett and others.

A) Anglicanism itself is only about 500 years old as a formal movement. That’s curious for someone wanting to enter the stream of the ancient and medieval church. If your entire hermeneutic rests on continuity with the first 1500 years of church history, it seems relevant to point out that Anglicanism as a formal movement did not exist during that time.

B) Anglican churches have had real struggles with doctrine and ethics. I don’t mean this as a “gotcha” statement, for Baptist churches have their own struggles. It is simply the case, however, that Anglican aesthetics and liturgy and historical connectionalism have not prevented Anglican churches from having momentous doctrinal disagreements of their own.

With the excitement of a fresh convert, Barrett seems to not see this. His enthusiastic celebration of Anglican liturgy, for example, as vital to meaningful Christianity seems to miss that such beautiful liturgy has not prevented scores of Anglicans from failing to walk with Christ. Nor has Anglican polity prevented the church from various trials and scandals.

In fact, the congregation Barrett is joining has a key Anglican leader based out of it who has been embroiled in controversy for several years now. This is noteworthy, for Barrett describes “the office of bishop so instrumental to implementing doctrinal accountability in the church” as emblematic of Anglican health. Yet according to Anglicans themselves, the ACNA has issues to sort out at this very level.

C) Barrett has aligned with feminist theologians out of step with historic doctrine. If the theology of the first millennium and a half of church history is what animates you, surely it should trouble you greatly that a female theologian named Amy Peeler has promoted a vision of God as “mother.”

Yet this has not kept Barrett from enlisting Peeler as a contributor in On Classical Trinitarianism, his recent edited volume on the doctrine of God. If “classical Trinitarianism” leads you to link up with egalitarian theologians who recast God as “mother”—over against Jesus, who taught his disciples to direct their prayers to “Our Father” in Matthew 6:9—then any Bible-loving Christian has serious grounds to evaluate such a theological camp with great care and wisdom.

D) The Great Tradition is not nearly so monolithic as some suggest. The “retrievalist” hermeneutic is presented as a grand unifier of turbulent tribes. There may be a degree of agreement reached through a common focus on Nicaea, for example. But we cannot miss this: Nicene agreement already exists between Catholics and Anglicans in formal terms, yet these two movements are not at all the same.

Furthermore, retrievalism is not an extra-interpretive movement; someone has to standardize it and lead it. This reminds us of an important point: retrievalism is not at all free of subjective preference. It has not descended from the skies as a pure body of thought. Retrievalists themselves—just like the biblical personalists they critique—pick and choose.

Seventh, there is an uncomfortable reason why the medieval church enjoyed such remarkable theological consensus. This reason, quite frankly, is not a pleasant one to think about. The Catholic Church was able to achieve the doctrinal unity it has enjoyed over the centuries in part because it ruthlessly persecuted dissenters from its body of theology during the medieval period. Many who did so—like the Waldensians and Lollards—paid the price of death for their dissent.

We should keep this in mind when retrievalists sing the soprano part about the Great Tradition having glorious unity in the pre-Reformation era. The Catholic Church, in the clearest analysis, achieved a good measure of that unity the old-fashioned way: the sword. We do well to remember this cold, hard truth when the “Great Tradition” is presented against a golden backdrop.

Eighth, we should recover “theological triage” once more. As I have been at pains to say, the sharper edge of the retrievalist movement argues that where creeds and councils have spoken to an issue—the question of the “will[s]” of God, for example, or the seeming descent of Christ into hell—that issue is settled.

To put it mildly, this is a different conception of theological formation and debate than that held by previous generations of evangelical theologians. We call the method pioneered by evangelical theologians—Carl Henry at the top of the list—“theological triage.” Christian theologians who employ this grid do not present their particular doctrinal view as the only acceptable one.

Instead, they embrace a very different scheme than that of “Pure Doctrine.” In theology, some issues are indeed first tier, essential to the faith, and must be confessed by all. But other issues are second tier, important but not salvation-dependent, and still others are third tier, consequential but fair game for different interpretation. Many gospel-loving Christians have worked hard to honor disagreement on both second tier and third tier matters.

On this count, it is not too much to conclude that “theological triage” vaulted partnership in the gospel far beyond the measure reached by previous generations. As just one example, the Reformers shared much in common but faltered in unity due to disagreement over the Lord’s Supper. This reminds us that it often takes time for Christ’s church to reap the abundant harvest of truth in Scripture.

For example, in the last 200 years of Reformed history, the disciplines of exegetical interpretation, biblical theology, biblical counseling, biblical ethics, and biblical worldview have flowered as never before. In tribalistic days like ours, perhaps we do well to think afresh about recovering “theological triage,” and questioning whether the sharp-elbowed neo-fundamentalist approach of “Pure Doctrine” is helping the church or hurting it.

Conclusion

As those who write and teach theology, we need to care well for our students, shepherding them to understand that Protestantism came out of a real break with Rome’s doctrine, ecclesiology, and method. Sola Scriptura is not branding; it reflects both the Bible’s conception of the Bible, and our own program for interpreting it.

In our day, we should carefully evaluate this question: Does embracing retrievalism—as promoted in its most uncompromising form—sometimes destabilize Baptist and evangelical convictions? The answer, quite simply, is yes. This reality should sober us; it should provoke humility, repentance, and clear-eyed evaluation of retrievalism in Christ’s people. We are not playing with Monopoly money here; the well-being of souls, nothing less than their eternal destiny, rests upon such efforts.

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Image of St. Paul’s Cathedral, London: Ronnie Macdonald from Chelmsford, United Kingdom (Wikimedia Commons)