My last blog opened with this sentence: “It is increasingly fascinating to me how nearly every
organization, regardless of its original motive for existing, eventually caves
to some form of self-preservation as its primary function.” Near the end, I wrote: “For any organization
to call itself “Christian,” it must be an organization where the care of
people, love in action, the human enterprise, consistently and clearly trumps
programs, policies and profit.”
I believe that Jesus’ “Great Commission” in Matthew
28:19-20 to go make disciples of all nations is a moral imperative for the
Christian Church, and as a subset, a moral imperative for the Seventh-day
Adventist Church. If this is true, then our
current system makes us responsible for the immoral use of resources to provide
carbon copy systems of church governance over the same territory based on
racial division.
It was obviously necessary, or at least thought to be so,
at one point in American history. But now it appears, to thinking people who
support racial integration, to be part of the plague of “self-preservation” as
its primary function.
In Florida, there is the “Southeastern Conference of
Seventh-day Adventists,” covering almost the exact same territory as the
“Florida Conference of Seventh-day Adventists.”
For many years we “forgot” their official titles and called them the
Black Conference and the White Conference!
Yes, there was a time when that was a pretty accurate and
maybe a necessary reality. But today we
have Southeastern Conference, which is predominantly mono-ethnic, and Florida
Conference, which is exceedingly multi-ethnic.
To maintain a governance structure based on race must be
a program, policy, and profit issue of the past—we must abandon self-preservation
of an antiquated and wasteful system. The coming generations will find our
system so egregious as to be an excuse for seeking a different or
non-denominational affiliation. No
matter what you call it, they are rightly embarrassed by what is still seen as a
black and white governance structure.
The self-preservation of the current system, the
programs, policies, and profit (financial support system) goes against the very
prayer of Jesus that his people be one, and from a resource management
perspective, every dollar used to support duplicate governance structures is an
immoral use of funds that could better be used to fulfill the Great Commission.
Doing away with our current structures to create
something new will have little effect on most of the local churches. Those which are mono-cultural will likely
stay that way, and those multi-cultural ones won’t regress. But whether I have an African American or
Caucasian or Hispanic Conference President should make no difference. Our unity is not in our ethnicity or
nationality; our unity is in Christ. In
him there is no Jew nor Greek, male nor female, slave or free. If gender is irrelevant in Christ, certainly
there can be no division over ethnicity. Let’s get over any paranoia and do the
right thing, the moral thing. The loving care of people must drive us to alter
our insane attachment to self-preservation, and the abandonment of any program,
policy, or profit that stands in the way of doing the right thing.
This immoral use of resources must end.
Andy McDonald
Self preservation exists in many areas and decreases our ability to remain true to our original gospel calling.
ReplyDeleteThis blog provokes many thoughts…
ReplyDeleteI wish that the existence of white and black conferences were simply a matter of “economic waste”. Perhaps this is an oversimplification of complex issues that persist in our nation and within our church?
In technological terms, “redundancy is a common approach to improve the reliability and availability of a system. Adding redundancy increases cost and complexity of system design… and many applications do not need redundancy in order to be successful. However if the cost of failure is high enough, redundancy can be an attractive option. “ (NIWeek 2012 original publish date 1/11/08)
(I am so tempted to digress and discuss the redundancy that exists in the local church/local conference/union/division/general conference structure. While I would never call this immoral, “thinking people” might question whether this too is self-preservation. But I digress….)
The persistent complexities of race that exist in our nation continue to be one of our thorniest issues. These complexities also exist within our church. “Redundant systems” were established within our church organization because the risk of failure for a segment of our society was high. Yes, we’ve grown and we’ve improved - but we have not made it to the Promised Land. The persistence of predominantly monoethnic churches within the multiethnic Florida conference (and other conferences) certainly begs the question of your argument’s premise. As a point of understanding, the Southeastern Conference of Seventh Day Adventists is indeed multiethnic. Frequently its assumed that all Blacks are the same, but the Southeastern Conference has many ethnicities as its members – from various cultures within the America’s, the Caribbean, Europe and predominantly Spanish speaking countries.
By all means let’s get rid of waste – but please let’s not throw out the baby with the bathwater. Let’s ensure that our risk of failure in fulfilling the great commission is minimized, and that every person of every gender, race and culture can find his/her place in the body of Christ. We want to do this for the fastest growing segment of our Adventist population – that is, people of color, and we want to ensure this for dying and threatened segments of our church – our white population and young people of all groups.
(Part 1 of 2)
Part 2/2
ReplyDeleteTo wit, we know that people of different cultures, ethnicities and genders also want to enjoy representation of their groups in our church’s leadership. The fear that there will be a loss of representation or meaningful seats at the dialogue/power table is the elephant in the room we are loath to discuss. This is an ongoing issue for local conferences as well as our General Conference. This must be addressed. It is an issue in our nation and it is an issue in our church. To sweep this under the “why- can’t- we- all –get - along” rug, (and by the way, that means you-regional conference, join me), is naive and shortsighted. It appears to me that until our church leaders are willing to get in the room and deal with the conflicts of privilege and prejudice and its attendant pain, not much can change. To propose a solution before we can courageously deal with the problem may lead to unintended consequences that the redundancy has prevented. It concerning that you call such redundancy “immoral”. Do we in fact want to say that the existence of Black conferences is “corrupt, unscrupulous, unethical and a transgression of moral values” (see “immoral”, defined, Webster)? I certainly don’t.
At the end of the day, people reaching people and exposing them to Christ as the great lover and Savior of all nations, kindred, tongues and people is the fulfillment of the Great Commission. I want to be a good steward – we have to be. I want to eliminate unnecessary costs. I’m not willing to cut off our organizations nose in the face of an issue that transcends economics. We can be better and we have to deal with our issues. White churches melding into regional conferences, Black churches melding into state conferences, one conference – all possible options.
Let’s just get there responsibly.
Well said Monica. Certainly we want to get there responsibly but to continue to make no movement and to continue to have duplicate systems of governance opens the church to major and just criticism from those outside our denomination and our next generation. Somehow in the western United States we've figured this out. Of course maybe the answer is to do away with conferences and only have unions in the age of technology and easy transportation. I'm happy to give up the Florida Conference and join South Eastern especially if that means that most of the overhead cost of running a conference office could be distributed back to the local churches. I know there are many issues to wade through but as we approach 50 year anniversary of civilrights legislation in our country it is simply time for the church to catch up and act like the church who's identity is found in Christ. I agree let's getthere responsibly but lets get there. Thanks for sharing.
DeleteSounds like you're still trying to deal with an efficiency/economic problem, when I am saying this is not "the" issue. (every question has an answer so we must make sure we are dealing with the right question).
ReplyDeletePeople have made progress, Andy. (there are 5000 who have not bowed the knee to Baal...) I think the question exists at the local church level but again, the bigger question is whether ministers and the organized church will take the time to have the debate and deal with the elephant (see my first blog response). If we spent as much time on this issue and saw as many position statements on race as we have throughout the years on women's ordination, then more knowledge would be shared and perhaps more progress would be made. As with women's ordination, only perhaps though. We cant just share knowledge; we have to experience pain, and walk in each other's moccassins - and then prayerfully look for solutions.
I could care less what people on the outside of the church think - what is that to thee? We need to thoughtfully deal with our people and our issues.
I love that you believe this so strongly, my fear (if I may be so vulnerable) is that you believe it for the wrong reasons - so what you will wind up with is a window dressing change that gives you a few more dollars in your church pocket, but no real healing of people. That, in my mind is a travesty.
I will pray for your ministry as you talk with Florida and Regional Conference officials. We both know that the conference is not yours to offer. However your church and your ministry is. I pray for you as you contemplate this next step that will allow you to begin the movement. I selfishly pray that you do it for the more complex reasons of my first blog and not for overhead reduction. (I'm not sure that you realize that many people of color would see your premise as a slap in the face, which would do more damage than good to the Great Commission.)
From my perspective, the civil rights movement then (and now) was not prompted and does not exist as issue for overhead reduction - although redundant toilets, bus seats, restaurant counter tops, water fountains and different or nonexistent voter registration processses were certainly costly and expensive. The civil rights movement was a movement of the heart that said that every individual is created by God and therefore has the right to have an equal participatory seat at the Welcome Table. Once that was addressed in a major way, some duplicate/redundant systems were removed. Title IX for example is a redundant system that still exists so that females can have a real seat in the world of high school and collegiate sports. Are you suggesting it be removed because its expensive and redundant (yea even, "immoral")? Heaven forbid!
Civil Rights has never been about money. If trying to save money is what you're after, you might do better with Unions. ( I look forward to your follow up blog on the immoral redundancy of Unions!)
Thanks for the dialogue Andy. You've allowed me to reexamine my beliefs, seek God, and as always deepen my desire to understand the question.
Monica
Jesus said that the "oneness" of his followers would be the primary testimony to the world that God sent him. (John 17:20-21) So our practice and what the world thinks seems pretty important to Jesus on the oneness issue. Seems we still have miles to go.
ReplyDelete