KEARSLEY Baptism Then and Now 247
later work. Some of the best examples appear in his treatment of the Holy
Spirit. It is not the nature of the Holy Spirit to be imprisoned in ecclesiasti-
cal forms and the sacraments. Fear of religious 'free-thinking', he argues,
led more and more to reserve in the doctrine of the Holy Spirit:
In reaction against the spirit of the new liberty—freedom of belief, freedom
of religion, freedom of conscience, and free churches—the only Spirit that
was declared holy was the Spirit that is bound to the ecclesiastical insti-
tution for mediating grace, and to the preaching of the official 'spiritual
pastors and teachers'. The Spirit which people experience personally in
their own decision of faith, in believer's baptism, in the inner experience of
faith in 'which they feel their hearts strangely warmed'.. .and in their own
charismatic endowment, was declared 'unholy' and enthusiastic.^44On Moltmann's account: (1) the Spirit of Life is the liberating Spirit, the
Spirit of freedom; (2) this freedom is known in baptism. But, of course,
since baptism is about calling, then the discipleship of Jesus and the liber-
ating Spirit act together to lead people into true freedom.^45 Once again
Moltmann unites lordship and freedom:
What from the side of the intervening, apprehending God is called 'lord-
ship' is called freedom on the side of the people who are apprehended or
possessed by that lordship; and this freedom has nothing to do with slavery,
either outward or inward. That is why this lordship is better described as
'the free power' and the 'free space' or 'free place' of human freedom...
Anyone who experiences God and 'deification' (theosis) of this kind, is
freed from all the godless ties of this world, and is nobody's slave.^46Undoubtedly there is a temptation to suspect Moltmann of assimilating
'divine lordship' to human freedom. But it is always more likely that
Moltmann is defining 'lordship' as a liberation from other lords to be one
in solidarity with the Lord of freedom through suffering love. In other
words, the calling and freedom of baptism is a liberation not from respon-
sibility or expectation but from the power of the status quo, from safe,
political quietism into a disciple's life of solidarity with the oppressed—
and into political courage. Despite the danger of the narrowing of disciple-
ship to activism of some kind, the end result here is not acquiescence into
Enlightenment autonomy. It is not what may be termed 'nomophobia'
(neurotic fear of law or command) though much of that is about. The dis-
cipleship of the liberating Spirit, for Moltmann, puts the baptized into- Moltmann, The Spirit of Life, p. 2 italics added.
- Moltmann, The Spirit of Life, p. 121.
- Moltmann, The Spirit of Life, p. 121.