Friday, March 02, 2007
Reality And Ideology
In "Imperial Grunts" author Kaplan is in Yemen and interviews the American there to help that nation establish a Coast Guard. That person, Bob Innes, served in Vietnam and "...saw the last U.S. aircraft leave...." Innes reflects:
I trust the litany of church failings need not be reiterated; however, I would like to point towards one that is often overlooked. The obvious stuff like sex and financial scandals are bad enough - but what about the alienation of the "good and faithful servant" for the sake of the greater good. Remember back in December I quoted Dallas Willard and Jan Johnson stating that a person interested in genuine transformation would likely be viewed as "a hinderance" by the church. The way the church reacts to hinderances can often be amazingly nasty. Soemtimes I think such is the greatest ugliness of the church.
We combine these two strains of thought and I come to a very interesting place. The models for the institutionalization of the church are essentially state-like, perhaps all institutionalization is. Is there a radically different way to institutionalize; something not so state-like, so that the seeming inevitable corruptability, or at least amorality, of the institution can be escaped? If not, then what? Are we all to "sell out" to the inevitably corruptable? Is genuine Christianity destined to always be an underground movement? - Underground both societally and in the church itself? I think the is something to this latter question. But can one be underground while opeating the levers of institutional power?
I have been cladestinely informed that it is likley I will be asked to go on session this year. (Gee, that's no surprise really; I am asked virtually every year) But I am finding a bit of a tug, I did last year too. This spring sees the class of students my wife and I have sheparded through high school in a small group graduate. That ministry has been more rewarding, and more importantly, more fruitful, than all my session service combined. It has been an underground thing very much off the radar of the regular programming schedule in the church. Can I bring that experience to session, or will I simply find myself inevitably pulled into the vortex of crap?
I am a lousy middle manager, managing for managing sake. I certainly do not wish to go on session without a specific set of goals to accomplish. But the goals I have at the moment would be a "hinderance"....
Related Tags: institution, underground, genuine, session, faith
"What did I learn from the experience in Vietnam?" he asked himself out loud, letting the silence formulate his next statement. "I learned that honor and integrity are personal qualities, not institutional ones, not ones we should expect the state to always have. If you don't like the policy, tough. Bad things happen in this world. You do the best you can in your job, and let the crybabies write the books"The first part of that statement about institutional, not personal, qualities is I think right on about the church. As things now stand we work to build good people, but we worry not about the characterisitics of the institution - this is a fact that I have always decried. Such institutional ugliness in the church should not be accepted. I think Innes may be right when it comes to the state - but the church is a different animal. The church is as much the face of God on earth as each of us individually is. The institution simply must show the same outstanding qualities expected of the individual, or I think we will never get very far.
I trust the litany of church failings need not be reiterated; however, I would like to point towards one that is often overlooked. The obvious stuff like sex and financial scandals are bad enough - but what about the alienation of the "good and faithful servant" for the sake of the greater good. Remember back in December I quoted Dallas Willard and Jan Johnson stating that a person interested in genuine transformation would likely be viewed as "a hinderance" by the church. The way the church reacts to hinderances can often be amazingly nasty. Soemtimes I think such is the greatest ugliness of the church.
We combine these two strains of thought and I come to a very interesting place. The models for the institutionalization of the church are essentially state-like, perhaps all institutionalization is. Is there a radically different way to institutionalize; something not so state-like, so that the seeming inevitable corruptability, or at least amorality, of the institution can be escaped? If not, then what? Are we all to "sell out" to the inevitably corruptable? Is genuine Christianity destined to always be an underground movement? - Underground both societally and in the church itself? I think the is something to this latter question. But can one be underground while opeating the levers of institutional power?
I have been cladestinely informed that it is likley I will be asked to go on session this year. (Gee, that's no surprise really; I am asked virtually every year) But I am finding a bit of a tug, I did last year too. This spring sees the class of students my wife and I have sheparded through high school in a small group graduate. That ministry has been more rewarding, and more importantly, more fruitful, than all my session service combined. It has been an underground thing very much off the radar of the regular programming schedule in the church. Can I bring that experience to session, or will I simply find myself inevitably pulled into the vortex of crap?
I am a lousy middle manager, managing for managing sake. I certainly do not wish to go on session without a specific set of goals to accomplish. But the goals I have at the moment would be a "hinderance"....
Related Tags: institution, underground, genuine, session, faith
