When is a church not a church?

Posted on July 4, 2016 by David

According to Canada Revenue, when it is non-creedal and more interested social justice than divine justice.

The CRA is concentrating on Unitarianism at the moment but the Anglican Church of Canada easily slides into the same category. For example, St. John’s Shaughnessy rather than state what its members believe, advertises that it embraces doubt. Most dioceses concentrate on social justice and advocacy – couched in pieties from a Bible in which they have long ceased to believe – and the national church promotes political agendas while its bishops boast that they will accomplish something that the church’s founder said would never happen: eliminate poverty.

Come to think of it, since most clergy are, at best, fuzzy on the divinity of Jesus, the ACoC is, itself, effectively Unitarian.

From here:

It is not easy to get indignant over the Canada Revenue Agency’s audit of the Canadian Unitarian Council (CUC) — indignant, that is, either for or against. Unitarians are not supposed to inspire any strong feelings. They are, famously, only sort of a church; more of a disposition than a denomination, really.

Unitarianism is explicitly “non-credal,” ecumenical and receptive to “humanism;” the international statement of Unitarian “principles” mentions God’s love (with a capital G), but identifies “the guidance of reason and the results of science” as a source for what it is hard to call a “faith.”

[….]

The Unitarian council is angry, as the CBC reported Sunday, about a “political activities” investigation by the taxman. The CRA, it seems, is uncomfortable with the mentions of “justice,” particularly “social justice,” in the council’s bylaws. (The council is, organizationally, a close approximation to a national “Unitarian church,” although some small-u unitarian congregations are non-members.) Much, perhaps most, of what the CUC actually does has political implications and dimensions. The Canadian state has no objection to that sort of thing being done by a tax-exempt church, as long as the activity is “charitable.”

But auditors appear to be raising the obvious truth about the notion of “social justice:” that it is essentially politics; a metaphor imposed on religious scripture. The Bible, not that the Bible is of much use to Unitarians, does not promise social justice, but something like its opposite — perpetual inequality and suffering.

A Church that wants to be the State

Posted on September 13, 2015 by David

One of the favourite activities of mainline churches is not, as one might expect, saving people from hell and judgement but pestering governments on how they should run the country. In practice, this usually amounts to leftist agitating, couched in familiar clichés like speaking truth to power, or advocating for the [choose any of the following, alternating as needed to avoid vain repetition]: poor, marginalised, disadvantaged, refugees, migrants, or make poverty history – a less onerous task than simply helping the poor, since it can’t be done.

Part of the problem seems to be that the church is nursing the fantasy that Jesus spent his time confronting secular authorities. Tom Wright says as much in this article [my emphasis]. The fact is, though, he didn’t; Jesus reserved his harshest criticisms for the religious authorities – in today’s terms, people like….. bishops. Although he called Herod a fox, the Pharisees were likened to snakes and cosmetically disguised coffins.

The gospels are not, then, a compendium of detached moral maxims for individuals. Jesus’ sayings find their meaning within the larger story about new creation struggling to be born. ‘Supposing God was in charge,’ Jesus was asking, ‘might it not look like this?’ – as he healed the sick, fed the hungry, rebuked the arrogant, told sharp-edged stories, wept with distressed friends, and (not least) confronted cynical authorities. ‘God’s rule’ poses its challenge to nations and cultures, not just individuals.

[….]

This brings us to the other key point. Along with the absolute priority of looking after the weakest and poorest, the church has a specific vocation. One of the tasks Jesus bequeathed his followers is to hold earthly rulers to account. This doesn’t mean clever clerical soundbites, still less theologians aping one strand of popular prejudice. It means drawing on the sustained wisdom of the worldwide church, across space and time, to remind rulers (often distracted by the next election or referendum) what they are there for. Back once more to the Psalms, the prophets and Jesus’ vision of God’s Rule. At the climax of the fourth gospel, Jesus confronted Pontius Pilate on the topics of kingdom, truth and power. His followers need to do the same.

Jesus’ point to Pilate was, surely, that his kingdom and Pilate’s occupy a different dimension. The church can advocate until all its bishops turn blue in the face but God’s Rule is not going to be established until Jesus returns. Meanwhile, the church might want to consider getting back to the job of saving sinners from hell and judgement.

A New Zealand Anglican bishop does social justice

Posted on September 18, 2013 by David

The problem with most Anglican clergy who harp interminably about social justice is: first, they tend to use it to replace the Gospel of man’s eternal redemption through Christ’s sacrifice and second, they want everyone else to give their money to the less well off – usually in the form of higher taxes – while living in the lap of luxury themselves. Particularly bishops.

Bishop Justin Duckworth may still fall foul of my first point but at least he gives his own money away, takes the poor into his own house and exhorts his fellow clergy to do likewise: “I would ask that everyone else should be engaged in the moral conversation of when is too much too much.”

So, Anglican Church of Canada bishops whose raison d’etre is prophetic social justice making: how about giving away a sizeable portion of your over $100,000 salaries and taking homeless waifs into your own homes. Convince us that you are serious.

From here:

Wellington’s Anglican bishop says he may cut his own salary to help fund a “living wage” for cleaners, caregivers and other low-paid workers in Anglican churches and social agencies.

Bishop Justin Duckworth, a dreadlocked, Jandal-wearing priest who was an upset choice as bishop last year, is also challenging other high-income earners to take less to fund higher wages for the 39 per cent of Kiwi workers who now earn less than the living wage, defined by union and church groups as $18.40 an hour.

His current salary is about $63,000, or $30 an hour, plus a house.

“My personal response is in the future I have to look at what I am earning and say, what is appropriate for me to earn given that many people in our society don’t even have enough to participate meaningfully in our society,” he said.

“I would ask that everyone else should be engaged in the moral conversation of when is too much too much.”

The bishop, who has lived his entire married life sharing his family home with people in need such as lost teenagers and ex-prisoners, said he and his wife, Jenny, were also considering how to make best use of the bishop’s official home across the road from Parliament when they move there later this year from the community for recovering addicts and others where they have lived for the past 10 years.

“We have always lived with people. We will do that again,” he said.

Heavens Above! was a 1963 film about an English vicar who also took social justice seriously; it didn’t work out too well for him, but the film, based on an idea by Malcolm Muggeridge – who also had a bit part – was very good.

Here is a clip. Notice an astute child observing that the visiting bishop’s representative has “got a tail like a great big snake; it’s black.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zAYCYngNVdM

Bishop Colin Johnson eats Kraft Dinner to help the hungry

Posted on September 3, 2010 by David

When I was young and didn’t want to eat, my grandmother used chide me with the reproach that “children in India are starving”. Being a smartass even then, I suggested she send my parsnips to them. I remain unconvinced that stuffing myself with food I don’t want will be the solution to the problem of world hunger.

Like my grandmother, Anglicans in the Diocese of Toronto – led by the doughty Bishop Colin Johnson – probably mean well, even if their endeavours suffer from the same ignorance of cause and effect as my grandmother’s. They have come up with what appears to be the obverse of my grandmother’s scheme: help hungry people by making yourself hungry too. It’s a bit like throwing yourself in the water next to a drowning man, pretending to drown with him for a while and then getting out and drying yourself off while he sinks. Why simply help someone when you can embark on a noble campaign of Social Justice and Advocacy instead?

From here:

A woman flees an abusive situation and is left with nothing, not even a can opener. A disabled couple cannot work, have trouble getting around, and can barely afford to pay their bills. A boy comes to school hungry, because his father cannot afford to give him breakfast.

These are the people Ted Glover, a member of the diocese’s Social Justice and Advocacy Committee and a parishioner at St. George Memorial in Oshawa, will have in mind in October, when he lives for three days on food that would typically be handed out in a food bank hamper. They are all people he has met through his extensive volunteer work with social service organizations and his job as a teacher. The three-day diet is part of the Do the Math Challenge, a campaign that will see Anglicans, along with community leaders and other concerned citizens, calling on the government to bring about an immediate increase of $100 a month in social assistance rates, and in the longer term, revise social assistance rates based on actual local living costs….

Archbishop Colin Johnson, area bishops, and Evangelical Lutheran bishop Michael Pryse will also participate in the poverty diet.

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