A Sad State

Sorry for the last of posts. I'll do better.

As you may remember, I’m teaching a seminary course on the history of the Church. We’ve just spent the last several weeks in the muck and mire that was the Church of the Middle Ages. Story after story of episcopal , papal, and clerical greed, lust for power, and indifference to the needs of the people. After the students had read the material and before I began to supplement it with lectures, I asked them for their reaction. These were pretty typical.
“Disgusted!”
“Appalled.”
“If you’ve known this all your ministry, how did you keep YOUR faith?”

I thought the last question was a pretty good one. My answer was something to the effect that most of the time I could separate God from the Church. I meant that most of the time, I’m able to remember that we have not even come close as a Church to carrying out the work to which Jesus has called us. Largely because we are fallible humans who, when offered the opportunity, tend to misuse our power and position. We either get carried away with the belief that we’re God’s anointed and therefore can make no errors and admit no unrighteousness, OR we just like the power that comes from leadership positions—even though there is no real money involved anymore.

I remember being told by a friend in ministry years ago that, for the most part, I would serve parishes who were led by people, who in the “real world” were relatively powerless. Most would be blue collar or low level employees of companies in which they would take orders rather than give them. But at church, they would be on par with others and when they became leaders, they would bring with that the frustration of their daily lives. And they would play that out in their leadership style and decisions.

I really didn’t want to believe it. It’s true though.

There’s something else I learned on my own during the time I did business consulting. Most business leaders are not competent to lead their businesses to excellence. As long as they are making some money, they feel successful. Consequently, they tend to make poor management decisions. I had lots of companies pay me lots of money to continue to do stupid things. These people also become church leaders and muddle that work too. Even worse, they justify a lot of that poor decision making by saying, “The church is not a business.” Except, of course, when it comes to balancing the budget and giving less than adequate pay to their staff, and postponing capital expenses until something outrageous happens. [Remember, our current sorry situation in the good ole U.S. of A, was brought to you by these same people.]

I was also asked what the day to day life of people in the Middle Ages parishes was like, spiritually speaking. In fact, there is a lot of information available to answer that question. The short version is that for the most part, they did the best they could to get their spiritual needs addressed by a largely indifferent and unqualified clergy. True, of lot of that was through the development of many superstitions that are still present today. But, what the heck, you do what you have to.

I’d like to end on a happy note, but we’re in the middle of studying the Reformation. A movement meant to reform the Church and its practices and in which hundreds, if not thousands, were tortured and killed for the sake of uniformity and the glory of God. So, it’s a bit hard to be hopeful.

BTW, did you know that present research indicates that if the present trend continues, that by 2050, the majority religion in the U.S. will be Islam?

Peace,
Jerry+