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Brought to you by the Bible Society
Number 93, July 2018 ISSN 1837-8447
Because of her
Brisbane’s Aunty Rose Elu
Decision time for Churches top Uniting volunteering Church
How to love your enemy
Image: CF Photography
Celebrating Aboriginal women
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Obadiah Slope CALLED HOME: Another eternity quote to go with Ecclesiastes 3:15 and Isaiah 57:15 (ESV, KJV): “We fell from it, but our home is your eternity and it does not fall because we are away.” St Augustine, Confessions of a Sinner Book lV. It is not Scripture but it is a cool quote, Obadiah reckons. UN-AUSTRALIAN: An unfortunate headline in the national daily online featuring Eternity columnist Senator Lucy Gichuhi.
TAGGED: “#connectedwitheternity” is a twitter tag that Eternity should own. Sadly it’s from TAGHeuer watches. But “Eternity is beyond time” is Obadiah’s protest. FEAR FACTOR: Asked if he thinks God exists, the favourite atheist of many Christians, Jordan Peterson, told a Canadian journo, “I think the proper response to that is no, but I’m afraid he might exist.” TIE A YELLOW RIBBON: In the tiny Tuscan hilltop town of Gambassi Terme there were bunches of yellow ribbons and yellow cassia flowers hanging on each wall. As we left our B&B, a lady beckoned to us and showed us huge bunches of yellow in her garage. She was setting out to make the town even more yellow. “Corpus Domini,” she said motioning at the flowers. And immediately Obadiah could see the attraction of folk religion. A day of flowers. Something simple that even the simplest person can take part in. What could be an Aussie custom that Christians might do? TURNING POINT: Rosemary Neill’s story in The Weekend Australian about the late poet Dorothy Hewett’s two daughters, describing how their mother’s lifestyle amounted to them being underage in “a brothel without payment,” might mark a pendulum swing in our culture, Obadiah thinks. As Rozanna Lilley, the younger daughter, observes #MeToo was not there for them.
JULY 2018
Revealed: this papyrus piece is the earliest part of Mark KALEY PAYNE A Greek papyrus discovered by the Egypt Exploration Society (EES) is likely to be the earliest fragment of the Gospel of Mark, dated between AD 150 and 250. The papyrus was found in the city Oxyrhynchus, south of Cairo, in an ancient Egyptian rubbish dump. At this same site, hundreds of thousands of manuscript fragments were excavated around the turn of the 20th century (1896-1906). Only a fraction of the manuscripts excavated at that time have ever been published. Australian historian, pastor and author John Dickson was in Oxford’s Sackler Library last month and had the opportunity to examine the fragment under a microscope. He told Eternity it was a “beautiful experience.” “Handling this thing and reading the ink marks on such old papyrus transported me back to Egypt, where it was found and where we know Mark’s Gospel was very popular,” Dickson said. According to Dickson, the discovery of any manuscript is important because it “expands our collection of witnesses to the ‘original New Testament.’” However, this fragment is of particular importance given its early dating. “The more manuscript witnesses
“I will make you fishers of people.” The other side of the 5345 fragment. you have of a text, the easier it is to work out where changes have been made – if indeed they’ve been made.” This particular fragment of the Gospel of Mark has had its fair share of conflict. In 2012, claims surfaced that it was from the first century, which would place it within decades of the time of Jesus Christ. The claims were made before publication, when scholars would have the opportunity to examine the fragment for themselves. Suggestions that the fragment has come up for sale have further muddied the scholarly waters.
While Dickson says it’s a shame the fragment has been published after such hype, the official published account of the fragment, released this week, is “very measured in offering a date of late 2nd century or early 3rd century.” The fragment is tiny, only about 4cm long, written on the front and back, with about five to six lines of words, not all still legible. It has Mark 1:7-9 on one side, where John says he “baptises with water” but that Jesus will “baptise with the Holy Spirit,” and 1:17-18 on the other side, where Jesus calls the disciples to “Come follow me and I will make you fishers of people.” “There is only one substantial difference between what’s written in this fragment and what we find in our other manuscripts,” says Dickson. “Instead of ‘Jesus said’ [‘Come, follow me’], this fragment reads, ‘He said …’ It’s obvious that it is Jesus talking at this point, but the scribe just wrote ‘he’ instead of the name ‘Jesus.’” Dickson says the Gospel of Mark fragment is “a precious, incremental contribution to our overall picture of the spread of Christianity and the early Christian efforts faithfully to disseminate the gospel of our Lord.”
News 2-3 Bible Society 4 In Depth 5-8 Opinion 9-16
Quotable
Paul Oslington “Can we resist smug puts-downs about the ‘prosperity gospel’ and work together against the perversely pseudo-spiritual tendencies of much contemporary theology and church practice?” Page 9
Churchgoers volunteer more often ANNE LIM Australians who attend church are more likely to donate their time and money to the community, contributing almost half-a-billion dollars to the economy, according to path-breaking research released in Canberra by Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton. The research, conducted by Deloitte Access Economics, finds that people who start attending religious services as adults are 1.7 times more likely to be a volunteer – and 1.5 times more likely to make donations – compared with those who have never attended religious
services. “Religiosity is associated with 194,320 additional volunteers in Australia each year, who collectively contribute 30.5 million hours in volunteering time, or 2.4 per cent of total volunteering hours in Australia,” says the report, the first by a body called the Study of the Economic Impact of Religion on Society (SEIROS). “The monetary value of this volunteering time is estimated at $339 million. We also estimate that religiosity positively affects the likelihood of an individual to donate. “Our findings suggest that
religiosity brings about an additional $142 million in donations each year, or 1.7 per cent of total donations in Australia.” It estimates the total annual value to society of volunteering and giving associated with religiosity at $481 million. The report, prepared by economic modellers at Deloitte and based on a commissioned survey designed by SEIROS researchers, is the first to look into the impact of religious belief on the Australian community. It is based on data from a national survey of more than 7000 Australians. Neil Foster, a professor at
Newcastle Law School who is on SEIROS’s board of reference, commented: “Australia doesn’t support religious freedom just for the economic benefits that religion can bring, but the fact is that religion does on balance amount to a force for good in the community. This research is just a start at exploring this whole area in a rigorous and evidence-based way.” The study suggests a national survey be undertaken to provide data on the differences in the levels of volunteering and donating in society between those involved in religious activity and those not involved.
NEWS
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UCA faces decision time JOHN SANDEMAN This month the Uniting Church in Australia (UCA) will decide whether or not to adopt same-sex marriage when 265 members of the church’s National Assembly will meet in Box Hill, Melbourne, from July 8-14. The National Assembly’s likely to vote in favour of same-sex marriage leading to the rewriting of the church’s official marriage rite to include same-sex couples. Any new rite will be adopted in August. The postal survey result last year boosted the likelihood of change, but there has been a pushback by UCA evangelicals in the last month. An action group is asking ministers and churches to sign a statement originating in SA that reads: “If the 15th Assembly of the Uniting Church adopts these proposals ... we state that we will not accept these decisions, and we will stand apart from them in ways that we will determine after the Assembly meets.” The motion before the assembly adopts a new policy statement on marriage: “Marriage is a gift God has given to humankind for the wellbeing of the whole human family. For Christians, marriage is the freely given consent and commitment in public and before God of two people to live together for life. It is intended to be the
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mutually faithful lifelong union of two people expressed in every part of their life together.” The motion also says, “Ministers and celebrants authorised by the Uniting Church in Australia may exercise freedom of conscience with regards to accepting requests to celebrate marriages, including same-gender marriages.” In an explanation attached to the motion, the movers include this reason for the change “There are ministers and congregations who believe the change in our social context that allows same-gender marriage is consistent with the gospel, and want to be able to celebrate same-gender marriage as well as opposite-gender marriages. They are seeking the consent of the rest of the church to have this ability. They are not asking the rest of the church to agree with them, but allow them to follow their conscience in this way.” Local church councils will be able to choose whether same-sex marriages take place on their property or not. Clergy will have freedom of conscience to celebrate same-sex marriages or refrain. In 2011 the National Church Life Survey asked church attenders their view on same-sex marriage. The UCA results showed 26 per cent in favour, 18 per cent neutral or unsure and 56 per cent disagreeing or strongly disagreeing.
BAPTISTS RISE: Work has begun on four storeys of libraries, classrooms and a 600-seat auditorium that will form Morling College’s new Ministry and Learning Centre. Deals with property developers on the college’s site close by Sydney’s Macquarie Uni, and led by college principal Ross Clifford, mean the new buildings are debt free.
Sacred city of everyday items ANNE LIM A miniature “sacred city” made out of glass and china has won Perth artist Mikaela Castledine $25,000 in this year’s Mandorla Art Award for contemporary religious art, which had the theme of a new heaven and a new earth. Castledine’s crochet, glass and ceramic sculpture, entitled God Is in the House, was created from bottles and pottery “stupas” topped with spiralling crochet domes. Jarrod McKenna, Ric Spencer, curator at Fremantle Arts Centre, and Anne Ryan, curator at the Art Gallery of NSW, chose the prize-
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QUEENSLANDER: Leader of the “No” case in last year’s postal survey, Lyle Shelton, has been named as the lead Senate candidate for Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives.
Artist Mikaela Castledine with her winning artwork, God Is in the House
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winning work from 40 finalists. “We find the work is beautifully crafted, it uses all very humble objects, found objects which have been turned through the artistic process into something quite extraordinary,” said Ryan. A delighted Mikaela Castledine told Eternity the work evolved from a trip in 2015 to Burma, where her mother had been born. “She had Alzheimer’s and I wanted to go and find some of those memories that she was losing. I went to Rangoon, and I found the house where she was born and the church where she was baptised,” she said.
PRAYING NORTH: Open Doors estimates that more than 50,000 Christians are being held in detention centres, prisons or political camps in North Korea. Positive results from the recent summit may be slow, so Hebrews 13:13 still applies: “Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.” (ESV) BOOK NOW FOR CHRISTMAS: If your school has an SRE/SRI assembly, Quizworx puppet ministry would love to partner with you in Sydney and SE Queensland. quizworx.com BIBLE ADVANCE: 1200 “first” translations of the Bible serving 600 million within 20 years, is the agreed target for the United Bible Societies that met in Cuba last month. This will mean the “Bible poverty gap” will be reduced by more than 50 per cent by 2036.
OPEN MORNING 9.30am Saturday 28 July 2018
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BIBLE @ WORK
Arab-Israeli Orthodox children in Nazareth are loving their new Children’s Bible – the first children’s Bible in the Middle East.
Seeing, hearing and laughing with God ANNE LIM Father Bishara came to the ArabIsraeli Bible Society office in Nazareth with a big smile. The grey-haired priest in his black robes wanted to express his great excitement. For all of the 33 years he had been serving 17,000 members of his church in Nazareth, they never had a Greek Orthodox Children’s Bible – until now. With gratitude flowing from his lips, he held the first Arabic Children’s Bible in the entire Middle East next to his heart and began to explain how it had transformed his community. No longer did they have to struggle to get Arab-Israeli Orthodox children interested in reading the Bible. Now, even the young children had wide eyes when they saw the beautiful drawings in the new Bible. And as their parents read portions of the text they have
never heard before, they were “seeing, hearing, and laughing with God,” he said. Father Bishara was proud that the Children’s Bible contains Greek Orthodox illustrations and has been translated by one of the priests of his community. “It is very important for children to know their Bibles and doctrine, especially in our context where many people have lost hope and love. They need to know the word of God and how it can help them every day,” he said. He believes it is a turning Father Bishara point in his
406 million people have only parts of the Bible available in their language.
ministry and a great celestial seed that will bring forth a plentiful harvest. This month, Bible Society Australia is holding a special appeal aimed at supporting Bible distribution in nations where it is unaffordable or a challenge for Christians to receive a copy of the word in their heart language. BSA is seeking support to provide a Bible to people who either don’t have a Bible in their language or don’t have access to or can’t afford a Bible. We want to give a first Bible to those who have been waiting to receive a copy of God’s word. Maika Rasilisili from Maumi in Tailevu, Fiji, says being a translator of the Bible
Could you give $46* to help translate one verse?
into Maumi language encouraged her to use her own language, which had been dying. Having their language in written form through the Scriptures was also encouraging Maumi people to use their own language. “Our language was dying and I’m fortunate that I grew up with my grandmother, so I heard from her the Maumi language. My generation speaks Bauan. Those who speak the language are old and will not be around for long, so this translation salvages our language and our people and keeps it alive,” she says. “I thank God as I learnt that God is not for just some but for all the people, and the Scripture can be translated in my language. It shows me that God is not limited to one people or one language.” Reverend Tevita Nawadra, former president of the Methodist Church, says the Fijian New Contemporary Version Bible is
good for new believers because it is in simplified, everyday language. “This translation helps with our mission to reach out to those who are still out there and those who are growing in the faith. The old Fijian Bible is about 100 years old and some archaic words used in it are no longer used today. Some words used are rather awkward as the meaning for other dialects of Fiji may be rude and inappropriate. “The new translation uses everyday language – more simple and clear and really helps the understanding.” In Australia, it’s easy to forget that not everyone has the freedom and prosperity we enjoy in being able to own multiple copies of the Bible. Many people in the South Pacific and Africa are still waiting to have God’s word translated into their mother tongues.
+ If you would like more details, visit biblesociety.org.au/firstep
Call 1300 BIBLES (1300 242 537) or visit biblesociety.org.au/firstep
*USD35 per verse, info from United Bible Societies.
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More powerful than the Voodoo Naomi Reed Page 8 CF Photography
Aunty Rose Elu is a public speaker and active campaigner against climate change, as well as a leader in the Anglican Church of Brisbane.
Nailing the cultural bridge ANNE LIM When Aunty Rose Elu was sent to Melbourne to pursue her higher education, a fellow student called her dirty because of the colour of her skin. It was confusing for the young woman whose parents hadn’t warned her of the kind of place she was going to live or the prejudices she would face. “I was sent away from home to go down there for my education in Melbourne,” says Aunty Rose,
who was born on Saibai Island, a low-lying island in the top western Torres Strait, but moved to the tip of Australia as a child. “I was in Melbourne for 17 years and when I arrived there I had a big Afro and this woman wanted to touch my hair. I kept pushing her away because in my culture you don’t touch hair and she was very angry with me. She eventually told me that I was dirty, and I thought, ‘well, why would she say that?’ She looked at me and pinched me on my skin and said ‘eergh!’
“I didn’t want to stay there, and I wanted to go home, but my mother and father told me they did that for us to learn that these are the obstacles and you will overcome them. One day, God will give you the time and space to tell the people about us, about our culture, about our identity.” It’s been a long journey, but those early experiences in Melbourne strengthened Aunty Rose in her inner being so that she was able to take the leadership path her mother and father foresaw for her.
Aunty Rose is one of the female Indigenous church leaders Eternity is highlighting to mark NAIDOC Week, celebrating the history, culture and achievements of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. This year’s celebrations from July 8-15 are based on the theme – Because of Her, We Can! A world traveller and tireless campaigner on climate change – which is severely affecting her native island – she has presented papers at many forums and
universities around the world, most recently at the UN in Paris. She is a vocal member of various committees of the Anglican Church in Brisbane, where she is based, and has campaigned successfully for the state government to recognise customary adoption practices from the Torres Strait. As well as a BA in anthropology and political science, and a theology diploma, Aunty Rose has a PhD in customary law from the University of Hawaii. continued page 6
Presentations professionally interpreted into Auslan and spoken English.
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Price: includes twin-share accommodation with catered meals Twin-share: $330 (Early Bird $280) Single-private: room $390 (Early Bird $340) For more information and online registration:
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NOVEMBER 2-5, 2018
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Are you Deaf, hard of hearing, or an Auslan or NZSL signer—and interested in Christian fellowship? If so, this camp* is just for you. Enjoy worship, fellowship and fun at the Catalina Conference Centre, a fully accessible facility on the shore of Lake Macquarie, NSW, with a fascinating wartime history. Guest presenter is the “Aussie Pastor”, Lloyd Grolimund, of the New Hope Church in Western Sydney.
*Operated by the SDA Deaf Church Down Under, in cooperation with Christian Services for the Blind and Hearing Impaired.
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How Brooke Prentis learned to be ‘fully Aboriginal and fully Christian’ KALEY PAYNE It took Brooke Prentis, a descendant of the Waka Waka peoples in Queensland, a long time to reconcile her faith in Jesus with her Aboriginal identity. “I had once accepted myself as a Christian first, and then Aboriginal. But once I found access to, and learned from, Aboriginal Christian leaders to reverse that identity, I became free in Christ.” Brooke says she felt an intense calling towards social justice but struggled with the question of “Who am I?” for a long time. As she fought to match up her Aboriginality with her Christianity, she also had to fight to uncover how her Christian faith and social justice passion could coexist. Brooke, a spokesperson for Christian activist group Common Grace on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander issues, seems bewildered when I ask her where her passion for justice comes from. She can’t get past the suggestion that a quest for justice isn’t something natural, inbuilt. Because that’s the way it is for her. “I mean, I guess the pursuit of justice was instilled in me from when I was a small child. Definitely before I was a Christian. But it has certainly been strengthened since I became one,” she tells me. “I could always see that not everyone had the same start in life. Then I became a Christian, and no one cared if I was Aboriginal or not.” While studying to become a qualified company director (which she completed this year) and working as a chartered accountant, Brooke has also become an Aboriginal Christian leader. As well as her role with Common Grace, she also coordinates the annual Grasstree Gathering, a growing network of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Christian leaders, who gather “in God’s timing, when the spirit calls.” Her rise as a sought-after spokesperson for Aboriginal justice issues within the church – and outside of it – culminated in Brooke’s delivery of the Morling College Annual Tinsley Lecture earlier this year. In her address, she spoke about the meaning of “community” and how Aboriginal wisdom can enlarge and change the Australian church’s understanding of community and mission. Growing up in Redcliffe, north of Brisbane, Brooke says she’s always gravitated towards leadership,
Bridge
From page 5 But it is her work in various state government departments that has brought her most joy, because it fulfilled her father’s vision for her career path. “When I joined the public service 20-odd years ago, I came to do cross-cultural women’s training for the public servants, and even today I am in advisory capacity, and the people in higher places ask me to go and talk on Torres Strait culture,” she says. “I enjoyed it because that’s what
even in school where she learned a lot about her Aboriginal heritage as a descendant of the Waka Waka peoples. “I was the one who wrote the reports of our cultural excursions for the annual yearbook,” she laughs. In 2001, aged 21, Brooke was invited to church by her first friend at university, a fourth-generation Salvation Army soldier. She hadn’t known that Christians were involved in social justice. “I came to the Salvation Army and heard the story of William Booth [the founder of the Salvation Army and a 19th-century English social reformer] and thought, ‘Oh, he speaks my language! Christians can be into justice.’” Coming to faith was simple, but connecting her faith and Aboriginality proved more difficult. “Once I left high school, it was hard to find, and connect with, other Aboriginal people at university. I felt like I was in limbo land. And then I became a Christian, and no one cared if I was Aboriginal or not. It just didn’t come up. There were no other Aboriginal people in my church.” It wasn’t until 2012 that Brooke had what she calls a revelation. It was a big year: she became leader of an Aboriginal church in Ipswich – the Salvation Army’s only Aboriginal church in Australia – and she also attended her first Grasstree Gathering, founded by Aunty Jean Phillips, an Aboriginal Christian leader with more than 65 years serving in Christian ministry. “Grasstree was where my whole world opened up,” she says. It was there Brooke met Aboriginal Christians from other churches and denominations. She learned what other denominations were doing in the social justice areas she cared about. And she learned it was possible to be “fully Aboriginal and fully Christian.” “By reversing the idea that I’m a Christian and an Aboriginal, to saying I’m an Aboriginal Christian, it frees me to read the Bible without a Western lens, and to embrace the Aboriginal way, which can strengthen my faith.” In her original church, Brooke says, she became caught up in the “Western” way of structuring activities: “Church is on Sunday; there is a youth group; there is a children’s ministry; there is a Bible study … but there wasn’t much time to express Aboriginal culture through those ‘church’ norms. “But I can display my
I like, I like us to be understanding of one another, try and become one body in Christ. “I’ve really enjoyed my life and I’m still enjoying it,” she says, referring to her current job as a counsellor and Indigenous adviser at Relationships Australia. Aunty Rose says the vision and wisdom of her father, a chieftain from the Saibai Koedal clan, has guided her throughout her life. “He used to tell us when we were children, ‘there is a bridge and that bridge will never be finished, not in your time, probably not in your children’s time. This is a very long bridge and there’s not many nails
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Saying I’m an Aboriginal Christian … frees me to read the Bible without a Western lens.”
Aboriginality in my Christianity. “I can’t separate those two things now – they’re one and the same.” In the ten years between becoming a Christian and her first Grasstree Gathering, Brooke became disillusioned with the church. She felt intensely the call to social justice, and was confused that only a handful, rather than all, of her church friends would roll up their sleeves. “William Booth’s plea was to fight for these issues,” she says, “but I felt like there was no one, or only a handful of people, there fighting with me. I got the sense that even the Salvation Army was actually a middle-class, white church. And that’s not where William Booth wanted us to be, and not where Jesus wants any church of any denomination to be.” For Brooke, the connection between church and social justice as missions were “one and the same.” She spent 12 months praying, “God, what social justice area do you want me to be involved in? When the opportunity to lead the Salvation Army’s only Aboriginal church came up, Brooke took it as an answer to prayer. “God told me it was time to go and be with my people full time,” she says. When that church
was closed down just a year later – in 2013 – the hurt and sense of loss were so severe they have never left her. But now, as a spokesperson for Common Grace for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander justice, Brooke can see her social justice calling as an Aboriginal Christian being lived out. “Each of the issues that Common Grace is looking at – domestic violence, asylum-seekers and refugees, climate change – Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander justice flows through all of those things.” Brooke’s passion is to reach out her hand in friendship to help all denominations, including the
Salvation Army, and individual Christians to come on the journey with Aboriginal people in community, mission, and church. Brooke has seen many Aboriginal Christian leaders go unrecognised by the wider Australian church. She is determined to be a part of raising up a new generation of leaders, but also to be a loud voice pointing to the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders who have made a big impact. She’s talking about people such as Aunty Jean Phillips, one of her heroes (she was pivotal in Brooke’s own Christian development) and the founder of Grasstree Gathering, along with Uncle Graham Paulson and Uncle Ray Minniecon, whom Brooke describes as leading Aboriginal theologians. “This year’s Grasstree Gathering was really strong in terms of seeking out a new generation of leaders,” says Brooke, who is gradually taking over the reins of the recurring event. Brooke says the pursuit of justice is all about empowering others, an understanding she traces back to her mother. “She would always serve others and support others. That’s the example, I guess, that I’m trying to carry on.”
another and be part of that journey and try and understand and come to the common ground.” Aunty Rose says she has never wavered in her Christian faith and the doctrine she was brought up in as a young person, but she has found a way to mesh that with her culture. “Our people are spiritual people, we are seafaring people and our dreaming is from the sea and stars in the sky and the current and the waves in the sea. So we were brought up in the doctrine and rites of the Anglican church and discipline, but not losing the culture, of course, so that’s been
instilled in me from the time when I was born and baptised.” She is keen to point out that reconciliation came to the people of the Torres Strait before any change came to the Aboriginal people of Australia, partly because their history involved interaction with various early explorers but mainly through the coming of the gospel on July 1, 1871. “The main thing was in 1871 when the light came to our part of the world – that’s what they call it – I think that’s where the real reconciliation was. That was like the holy dove coming alive, bringing the gospel to our people.”
Brooke Prentis
that you fit into them holes.’ There are still people learning about that and it’s going to be a very long journey. I always go back to that, what he and my mother taught us. “I’d like all of us to listen to one another and I would really want us not to be judgmental. I want us to listen carefully to one another and learn from one another,” she says. “I’d like the Australian nation to know that we are a Melanesian race of people in Torres Strait, in Polynesia, and we have a different culture and a different tradition and a different heritage, language groups as well. All in all, I’d like the wider Australia to listen to one
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A pioneer who sees reconciliation ANNE LIM There was a lot of hype when Australia ordained its first female Aboriginal Anglican priest, Gloria Shipp, in 1996. It was a bold move by the Bathurst Diocese as it came amid vocal opposition to women priests in some parts of the church. Yet Gloria believes once the move was made, the powers-thatbe didn’t know quite what to do with her. She was in her 40s, married with two sons, when she felt God calling her to go into ministry. “I was reading Jeremiah that you don’t have to be educated, you just have to obey his calling,” she remembers. So when she was handed a petition opposing the ordination of women in her home diocese of Dubbo, she was doubtful. “A lady said ‘Gloria, I wouldn’t sign that if I was you because you don’t know what lies ahead.’ So I didn’t sign it.” When Gloria approached her priest to tell him of her calling, he rebuffed her, more because she was a woman than an Aboriginal, she believes. “Anyway, he spoke to the Bishop, Bruce Wilson of Bathurst Diocese, and he said, ‘I want to hear it from Gloria’s mouth, not yours.’ I always got on with him and so I told him and ... he just took control of it and sent me off. “I went back to TAFE then for 12 months to do more study to do my Year 10 certificate, and then I went to do theology in Darwin. It was ’93 when I was deaconed and ’96 when I was ordained. I was 48. I’ll be 70 this year.” Gloria spent the next decade travelling all over Australia speaking in churches and, eventually, she was given a church, St Luke’s in Dubbo, to manage. “There isn’t a state in Australia I haven’t been and done public speaking,” she says. “And then trying to build up a church here … but, anyway, after that there was so much pressure on, but I managed it all; but in the end after 10-12 years of doing it, I ended up collapsing. “I had a breakdown and I just left the church for a couple of years. I went walkabout for three years to get myself back to where I was. I think it was burnout. For ten years, non-stop travelling everywhere and doing public speaking and, in the end, I just collapsed under it all, and then I just went walkabout. I IN DEPTH
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‘The day I walked into Koorong’ TAMARYN RICKETTS, CUSTOMER
over my Bible and was led to Psalm 18. That whole passage has fed my hope in such a powerful way. Thank you Jesus. Going forward, that day changed my life; I am now the most gracious fruit bearer of a sound mind in God’s loving grace: I quit smoking, I don’t drink alcohol any more and stopped cursing. My heart has been transformed. I have accepted Jesus into my life; my partner asked me to marry him on Christmas Eve; I was baptised in the ocean at San Remo on the 6 February 2018; I have beared witness to others coming to Christ; he is restoring my family; I have been able to gift Bibles and pay it forward. Praise God for giving me vision when the darkness blinded me.
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In late August 2017, I walked into Koorong. My hair was dark, my face in lines of despair. I had soul but not life, broken and lost, so blind that I just couldn’t see. It was the first day in forever I had picked up the Bible and read from it. That was the day I met Nicola, a worker in Koorong, Blackburn, Vic. An avid bookworm, I was asked to go in and pick up a Bible called “The Message” for my partner, who had been in a Christian drug and alcohol rehabilitation centre at Nyora in Victoria called Remar Australia for a month. I was heading in for my first visit and church service that Sunday. Months before, I had a vision of his deceased grandmother, a simple message from her, a godly woman, that I must “lead him back to God.” Now I don’t know about anyone reading this, but to tell an addicted person whom you are separated from and who you had to turn your back on for their own good and for your own health ... that message, it was hard, especially for a non-believer as I was at that time. I didn’t understand how it would be met but I didn’t need to at that point; I was just the person chosen to give the message. And by the love and grace of God, he knew it was time to seek help, and that started what will now be the rest of my walk as a woman of faith as well. My partner – now with God’s blessing over us and the gift of forgiveness, my fiancé – had suffered greatly with drug abuse, namely ice. A very broken man, and now he is 10 months free of all addictions. The day I walked into Koorong, I was there for him – a typical story of “I was spiritual, not religious.” I had a warped vision of what being a Christian was, almost like drinking from a glass and looking through the bottom into what was a clear prism yet created a thick and distorted view. I walked through the door and a bookstore excites me at the best of times but this had a feeling about it, a blessing. I didn’t have much money, but I knew what I wanted. I asked Nicola for a hand in finding the Bible and her warm persona and kindness was almost like that big hug I had been waiting for: that warmness is what I would come to find is Christ working
The Koorong store in Blackburn, Victoria.
... I didn’t have much money but I knew what I wanted.”
within us and his spirit shining through us. What an absolute gift. I was tallying up my money in my head and wondering how I can get myself one also, speaking with Nicola about how I can and saying I will just come back. She went away and came back and said “this is a gift for you.” I don’t even think I knew what to say. I am pretty sure tears prickled in my eyes, and if they didn’t then they certainly started when I got home. It was the most sincere gift and I knew what having a Bible meant: it meant he wanted me to get to know him. I asked if she could write in it and the Scripture chosen is now almost a way of living and resting in him as I await restoration and purpose: “The Lord will fight for
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you; you need only be still” (Exod 14:14). What Nicola didn’t know at that point was my testimony. My personal story is one of triumph. I was and in some parts still am an abused woman multiple times over – the cycle I never knew how to break and almost felt like that was all I would ever amount to. I had suffered a marriage breakdown in 2012, which I am still recovering from. My two daughters from that marriage and I are experiencing a painful separation of our rights that has so far lasted three years and counting – maternal alienation and a form of domestic abuse by proxy. My home had been burned down by arson in 2015 and I lost all material possessions. I had suffered many mental breakdowns and been in and out of hospitals for mental health and on so many different medications. I found it hard to leave the house and sat on the couch for a year, barely even living. Don’t get me wrong: I pretended I was happy but inside I was in the type of pain that only those that have been in the dark can comprehend. I was broken. That was the first day I prayed
Psalm 18 ... That whole passage has fed my hope in such a powerful way ... ” COLIN RAWLINS, CUSTOMER SERVICE, ADELAIDE
God’s presence is shown very clearly in the lives of two customers from our Adelaide Store. The story goes like this: One day a customer came into our store, searching for a suitable Bible which she wanted to buy for her mother to read. After belonging to the Muslim faith for most of her life, this customer had just become a Christian herself. She said that her mother had recently shown an interest in the Christian faith and had asked for a Bible to compare with the Koran. Her mum was a woman who appreciated the finer things of life and therefore she wanted to buy the best one she could find, and she didn’t care how much it cost – she just wanted her mother to be encouraged to read it. After much discussion, she chose a leather-bound NIV Bible which was quite expensive. I prayed over the Bible asking for God’s blessing over the choice of the Bible, and that, as her mother read it, God would speak to her heart.
The very next day, an extremely excited daughter returned to the store praising God. Her mother had sat down and immediately read about the good news of our Lord and Saviour – a wonderful miracle had occurred at 3am that night, as God revealed himself to her mother. A few days later, the mother came into the store to purchase some Christian books. Being accustomed to the Muslim faith, she was an avid reader. At that time, by the way she spoke, one would have thought that she had been a Christian all her life. Soooo ... she went back home with over $800 of Christian books to read! Another amazing miracle! But wait, there’s more ... Sometime later, both mother and daughter returned to Koorong relating the story of how God had performed yet another miracle in their lives. The mother was on her way to Glenelg Beach, where she was to be baptised, when her Muslim ex-husband, who had heard of her impending baptism, tried to run her off the road. His attempts were fruitless. Triumphantly, she proclaimed, “God protected me from an awful fate, and I was baptised despite this traumatic experience!” And this is only one of many amazing stories from my 20 years working in the Adelaide Store.
RHEBAN BRADLEY, PREVIOUS STORE MANAGER, BLACKBURN
My first day as the manager of the Blackburn store in Melbourne was one I will never forget. I had a request to come to the front counter as a customer wanted to see me. The customer had a huge amount of stock that, from a distance, I suspected he wanted to return. My assumption was correct but not for the right reason. I don’t know if I could call him a customer; he was, in fact, a thief. See, he had stolen $400 worth of stock and the Holy Spirit had convicted him to return the CDs, videos (yes, videos!), books and Bibles, as he had given his life to Jesus. He admitted the stock was stolen and expected the police would need to be involved. I showed grace as I had been shown grace and forgiveness from Jesus for my sins, and did not involve the police. He then became a regular paying customer and the Holy Spirit turned his life around.
spent a lot of time in the bush just getting connections back.” After three years, Gloria established what has come to be called Walkabout Ministries, reflecting the wisdom she gained during her time away. The ministry, which is supported by the Anglican Board of Mission, encompasses chaplaincy at the Orana Juvenile Justice Centre in Dubbo, women’s camps, men’s camps (with husband Eddie), an elders’ outreach group, women’s dinners and women of the Bible days, an annual Christian rally and Reconciliation lunch, as well as a bread run, delivering to families in need. On top of all that she is honorary priest at Dubbo Anglican Church and chairperson of NATSIAC (National Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Anglican Council). Gloria, who now has 12 grandchildren and two greatgrandchildren, says she always felt different from the rest of her family. “When I was a kid growing up in Nyngan, the church was our refuge. I’d spend many hours because they had a library there and I used to love reading and I used to sit on the floor of the rectory and just read books,” she says. “So I went to church, but I wouldn’t say I was a Christian because there’s a difference between religion and religiously going to church because I didn’t really know who Jesus was until I moved to Dubbo. “Then I learnt more ... I had a very good friend and we went to church together and we wanted to be baptised in the Holy Spirit and be born again. My husband loves football, so when he watched football I’d go to my friend’s house and we’d spend many hours in the Bible, just praying, sharing things. She had three daughters and I had three sons, so we became really like sisters. Our kindred spirit was very close. I had a lot of healing take place. I also had a lot of spiritual stuff that needed healing.” Gloria is encouraged to see how many Aboriginal women clergy there are now, especially in the Northern Territory. When she went to study theology at Nungalinya College in Darwin, she broke the mould of Aboriginal women simply doing textiles or community work. “I think there’s still a long way to go, but now I can actually see more Aboriginal recognition happening within the church and especially in
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I think there’s still a long way to go, but now I can actually see more Aboriginal recognition happening within the church.” this diocese. “We have a priest here now who has put an acknowledgment on the pew sheet and wants to do some of the altar cloths in Aboriginal material. I’ve bought the material. There’s a little group now that want to know how can we make the church more welcoming to Aboriginal people. “In church I got up and said – through tears because I can’t talk without crying – I have waited for 20-odd years for this to happen and I’m just glad I’ve seen this change in my lifetime.”
An incredible achievement
ANNE LIM
missionaries and Bible translators from the There is a buzz of anticipation in Church Missionary the community of Gunbalanya, Society (CMS) – she about 360km from Darwin, across didn’t know much the East Alligator River in Arnhem about the Bible. Now, Land in the Northern Territory. she’s an ordained After three decades of work, the Anglican minister, first copies of the New Testament and a Christian leader in the Aboriginal Kunwinjku in Gunbalanya (also language are starting to appear. known as Oenpelli). The formal launch of the “Our language has Kunwinjku Bible will take place been given to us from on August 1, after which the 2000 God, so sharing the fluent Kunwinjku speakers in word of God in my language so the Gunbalanya and other parts of people can hear God calling them the Territory will be able to read in their heart language is very the New Testament plus Genesis, important,” Lois says. Exodus and Ruth in their own “I keep thanking the Lord. I’m language for the first time. looking forward to the celebration One of the first people to of the Kunwinjku Bible coming to receive an advance copy was Lois my homeland. The time has come Nadjamerrek, who worked on the for my people to hear a lot more translation for more than 20 years. about God and the love given to us When Lois started out as a Bible through Christ.” translator – working alongside Steve and Narelle Etherington Steve and Narelle Etherington, began the translation in 1984
through CMS, working with many local translators including Lois. Now, CMS missionaries Matt and Lisa Pearson are moving into Gunbalanya to help local people read the Bible. Matt says he already has two young men who want to read the Bible with him. “What a privilege to see Lois receive the word of God in Kunwinjku. We have a lot to give thanks to God for – and we’re asking that this message of hope will be kept safe by reliable people, and passed on to the next generation,” says Matt. As well as publishing the Kunwinjku Bible, Bible Society is also working on Bible engagement tools that help the community read it, including resources for kids.
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More powerful than the Voodoo NAOMI REED
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Carine told me that she grew up in Benin – a tiny, French-speaking nation in West Africa. Benin has a population of 10 million people, a sea port at the Gulf of Guinea, and it is the birthplace of the Voodoo religion. “When you Google our nation,” said Carine, “The first thing you see is Voodoo. It’s the traditional religion. It’s our culture. It’s even bigger than the culture, it’s our belief system. It’s the oldest thing. It rules everything. The first thing we know is Voodoo. And when I was growing up in the 1980s, almost everyone was a VoodooAnimist. Every family or village had their own Voodoo spirit. They would say, ‘This mountain is my Voodoo,’ or, ‘This river is my Voodoo,’ or sometimes their Voodoo would be the ground or a metal or a rainbow or a mermaid. In my mum’s ethnic group, the Voodoo was the python, so they would never kill pythons in her village. Sometimes a village has lots and lots of Voodoo spirits. “And as well as that,” Carine went on, “We believed in Mahu. Mahu is in charge of everything; he rules everything, and he decides everything. But he is very distant. No one can speak to him, so there are many Voodoo spirits, maybe 200 of them, little gods, to talk to. And the Voodoo spirits would come out at night to check on the town. When they came, they would make a sound like a whirling through the air. It’s so loud, it’s like someone is hurling a rope. Like this!” said Carine, whirling her arm around. “You can hear it from 10 kilometres away! I was so scared of the Voodoo. I’d stay awake all night if I heard it. Sometimes the Voodoo would come to our front door and just stay there. If we went outside, we would be killed, we knew that. Only the Voodoo priest can go out when the Voodoo is there. “My dad was a ship’s captain,” said Carine. “So he was away at sea a lot, but he was always practising Voodoo. He used to pay the priest to build our own Voodoos at home – out of grass and sticks and soil and blood and body parts. The priest would come every month and slaughter a chicken or a goat, and then it would be mixed together, and the whole thing would be formed into a mound that looks like a human – that’s the Voodoo. The Voodoo would then be placed in the backyard or inside the house.
At our house, we’d have Voodoos everywhere – in our bathroom and in the lounge room and under the bed – all of them were there to protect us. We believed it 100 per cent. “But then something happened in the early part of 1988. My dad’s boat was stolen – the grand fishing vessel, belonging to the government of Benin – somehow vanished overnight, and nobody knew how it happened, or where it went. There was an uproar … and my dad took the blame. He was responsible for the boat, so he had to explain it. He couldn’t explain it, and he was taken to court. Later, he was let out on bail but he was forbidden to leave the city. He lost his job, he lost his income, he lost his power and he lost his lifestyle. He had nothing at all. It was very hard for him. He began to drink more. “And time went by, until the end of 1989. That’s when my dad had a visit from his cousin, who was a Christian. And his cousin said to him, ‘You know, you need God in your life.’ My dad just laughed. ‘What are you talking about?!’ he said. ‘I’ve studied. I have a degree. I’m smart. I have Voodoos in my life! Why would I need God?’ Then my dad’s cousin asked him what he was doing on Sunday. ‘Nothing!’ said my dad. ‘I’m doing nothing. I’m waiting for the boat to be found!’ “But three Sundays later, my dad agreed to go with him to church, and the first thing he noticed was that the people in the church smiled at him. They welcomed him. And then a visiting preacher began to speak, from Ecclesiastes 1:1-12. The speaker said that everything in life was meaningless, including work and the generations and knowledge and even the water cycle, without God. My dad thought it was amazing. Somehow the preacher was describing his life! But then he wondered how the preacher knew him. He didn’t even plan to be at church. Then my dad thought he might get up from his seat, but he couldn’t. It was like something was holding him there. And afterwards, he knew he needed to talk to the preacher … and his cousin introduced them and they talked for two hours. By the end, my dad decided to follow Jesus. “And that was the beginning of my whole family coming to Jesus,
Voodoo dancing in Benin, West Africa
and the beginning of the end of the Voodoos.” “It’s an amazing story,” I said later, and we kept talking. Carine described what happened next, including the day they burnt the Voodoos. “We went to the church that day and that’s where they burnt the Voodoo. It was such a big celebration. But it was stressful for me too. I knew that people have died burning their Voodoo. But I could see my dad crying with joy. I’d never seen that before! Everyone was singing about the glory going to Jesus. I didn’t know what that meant, but I’d never seen my dad like that before. I couldn’t believe it.”
I smiled with Carine. It was an amazing story. We talked together about her own conversion and church and her friends and her Bible study … but I still wondered if the fear of her early years went away. “Could you still hear the Voodoo spirits at night, after you became a Christian?” I asked. “Yes, I could still hear them,” said Carine. “The Voodoo were still outside at night and we were under the same rules to stay inside. But I wasn’t scared anymore. I was never scared after the day we burned the Voodoo with my dad. It is true what it says in 1 John 4. “The One who is in you is greater than the
one who is in the world.” Jesus is greater than any power! So the Voodoo spirits came to our house, because they liked to provoke the Christians, but they didn’t have any power over us anymore. We weren’t scared anymore.” This is an edited extract from Naomi Reed’s new book, Finding Faith – Inspiring Conversion Stories from Around the World. (Authentic Media, UK, 2018). Available at koorong.com and in all good bookstores www. NaomiReed. Info
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Two cheers for the prosperity gospel
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The unfairness of grace Greg Clarke Page 16
As someone who has written extensively on the relationship between economics and Christian theology, and now working to build a Business Faculty in a prospective Australian Christian university – Alphacrucis College associated with the Pentecostal movement – it is hard not to think about the prosperity gospel. Especially as the most common complaint I hear about Pentecostals over a postchurch cup of tea in older churches is that they preach prosperity rather than the true gospel.
What is prosperity theology?
The term “prosperity gospel” tends to be used by outsiders rather than participants. Like “neoliberal” or “fundamentalist,” labelling something the “prosperity gospel” closes off further exploration and makes critique unnecessary. If it is to be more than an
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It is pretty clear empirically that Pentecostalism has positive economic impacts.”
discussing prosperity preaching. Bowler as a historian and a Canadian resists extending the US experience to the rest of the world, or even using it as the pattern for studying the rest of the world. For instance, in the US the largely white Pentecostal denominations are strongly supportive of the existing political and economic order, while in Brazil, with the largest Pentecostal population in the world, it is a countercultural rejection of traditional Catholic religiosity and political establishment. In South Korea, to take the example of Yong-gi Cho’s Yoido Full Gospel Church in Seoul, Pentecostal prosperity preaching is different again. There, and in China, the prosperity gospel is intertwined with longstanding elements of the local culture. In both Korea and China it has grown largely independently of the American prosperity preachers, and is suspicious of the American political order. Prosperity preaching in Africa is different again, rejecting both the European
life-of-pix /sarahbabineau
Paul Oslington on hard and soft prosperity
empty term of abuse, we need to identify its characteristics. Prosperity preaching insists that salvation brings material blessings, sometimes with particular words or actions such as financial giving needed to activate this material blessing. It is often associated with an insistence that salvation brings physical healing. Prosperity preaching is wildly popular in many parts of the world, especially but not exclusively in Pentecostal churches. The seeming paradox of prosperity preaching appealing to the poor is often noted. But should we be so surprised that a gospel of material uplift and physical healing appeals to those in most need of this? As Jesus said, it is not the well who need a doctor, but the sick. Kate Bowler in her wonderful book about the prosperity gospel in America identifies four characteristics: (1) Faith as power (2) Wealth (3) Health, and (4) Victory. She also distinguishes between “hard” and “soft” versions of the prosperity gospel. The hard version makes material prosperity conditional on actions like tithing from one’s income, offerings to the preacher’s ministry, and so on, while the soft version is about economically relevant behavioural change. The changes from soft prosperity preaching are divine activity just as much as the hard version. And there are charlatans in both types of prosperity preaching – as with any human activity. Context matters a lot when
colonial heritage and Western “social scientist” scripts of African victimhood that the post-colonial states have exploited to justify continuing African poverty. Pentecostals have been prominent in movements for African political renewal. In Australia Pentecostalism has concentrated on individual transformation, mostly avoiding wider political and economic issues, reflecting the diversity of views in the movement and the individualistic nature of Australian society. Appreciating the variety of local contexts is important in understanding the prosperity gospel.
Why does it work?
It is pretty clear empirically that Pentecostalism has positive economic impacts. Some of the divine activity pointed to by prosperity preachers is not amenable to social-scientific analysis, but a lot is. What might be the social-scientific mechanisms for prosperity preaching and the growth of Pentecostalism to have economic consequences? • It provides a powerful new identity to converts, transforming both personal self-image and a person’s position in the social order. This is particularly powerful where tribal or caste identities retard economic progress, or where the poor have been taught to identify themselves as helpless victims of colonialism or the neoliberal economic order. • It gives agency to the poor, who are unused to but often welcome the sense of being able to
transform their situation. • It neutralises the power of evil spirits and witchdoctors as retardants of economic progress, removing this as an explanation of continued poverty. • It encourages clean living: no more heavy drinking, drugs and visiting prostitutes. • It encourages saving. • It underpins educational investments, especially in children of poor communities. • Churches provide networks, which are valuable for finding jobs and starting businesses. This is particularly powerful where church networks cross social and economic boundaries. • Churches provide opportunities for leadership training. This is particularly lacking in poor communities and so can be powerfully transformative. Evangelism emphasised by Pentecostal churches is excellent training for business entrepreneurship. • The social insurance provided by church communities facilitates risk-taking by reducing the downside risk for entrepreneurs in churches. Not all of these effects are unique to Pentecostal Christianity, but the combination is powerful. As well as recognising the economic benefits of prosperity preaching, we need to pay attention to the casualties. When individual agency is overemphasised, then it becomes the individual’s fault when economic success doesn’t follow. Those for whom prosperity continued page 12
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Two cheers
from page 11 doesn’t work often leave or are pushed out of prosperity churches, departing emotionally damaged and economically disempowered by the experience. This selective dynamic whereby failures leave and the successes stay and tell their stories, of course, contributes to the aura of success around prosperity churches. For social scientists, it is the net economic effect, including the damage done to the leavers, that is relevant.
pixabay / Stevebidmead
Prosperity preaching as recovery of a Scriptural teaching
Prosperity preaching rightly recognises the material dimensions of salvation, which have often been neglected in the Christian tradition. The Christian Scriptures are not as squeamish as the subsequent tradition about the material dimensions of life. Instead, the Scriptures are full of marketplace models and images. The Hebrew Scriptures often describe God’s activity in economic terms. For instance, redemption is buying something back that has passed out of the owner’s possession, and always a price is paid. Deuteronomy 7:18 speaks of Israel redeemed from slavery in Egypt, Isaiah 43 of Israel redeemed from Babylon, the book of Ruth describes her redemption, and David speaks of God as his redeemer in 2 Samuel 4:9. In the New Testament, the economic image of redemption is picked up in a number of places. Jesus explains in Mark 10:45 that
the Son of Man gives his life as a ransom for many, Acts 20:28 that the church has been redeemed by Christ’s blood, and Paul in Colossians 1:14 that it is in Christ that we have redemption. Another of the main images for God’s dealings with us is reconciliation. The word came from market exchange and accounting, and then was applied in other settings such as marriage, and divine-human relationships. For instance, Romans 5:10-11, where Paul explains that we are reconciled to God through the death of Christ. In 2 Corinthians 5:18-20 the word is used both for God’s work and the Christian community’s call to be agents of reconciliation. God’s reconciling activity is extended to the whole world in Ephesians 2:16 or Colossians 1:19-22, where all things
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are spoken of as reconciled to God through Christ. God’s activity is directly described as economic in several places in the New Testament – for example, Ephesians 1:10, 3:2 and 3:9, where the economy of salvation is an expression of the wisdom of God. It is not just God’s and the Apostle Paul’s activity that are described as economic but the content of the gospel as well – for instance, in 1 Corinthians 9:17. The recent work of John Barclay, one of today’s most influential New Testament scholars, and others on gift and grace in the Pauline epistles further emphasises the materiality of salvation. Barclay carefully studied first-century Roman and Jewish understandings of gift, as these illuminate what Paul means when he writes of grace and what his readers
Prosperity preaching rightly recognises the material dimensions of salvation, which have often been neglected in the Christian tradition.”
understood. He argues that Paul’s language of grace is much more material and reciprocal than most contemporary theological accounts of gift and grace, and that churches have often overspiritualised Paul’s teaching. If Barclay is right, then we need to be more open to receiving material as well as spiritual dimensions of God’s grace, and blessing others materially as well as spiritually.
Prosperity preaching in Australia
What about the complaint that the Australian Pentecostal movement, including Hillsong, C3 and many other churches, preaches a damaging prosperity gospel rather than the true gospel? The first thing that has to be said is that older churches that neglect the material dimensions of salvation should examine their own practices before rushing to condemn occasional overreactions in the other direction. The recovery of the material dimensions of
the gospel is part of the reason for the success of Pentecostal churches, a success which older churches benefit from when people converted in Pentecostal churches transfer to older churches. My sample of Pentecostal preaching is small, and so I have examined the writings of Australian Pentecostal leaders such as Brian Houston and Phil Pringle in forming a view of Australian prosperity preaching. On the whole, the preaching I have heard and these writings are sensible and biblically infused advice for individuals about personal finances. Financial success is viewed as part of a wider flourishing that God desires for people. I see no evidence of a hard prosperity gospel – and if it is to be described as prosperity preaching then it is of the soft kind – the kind that is largely amenable to socialscientific analysis. Unfortunately we don’t have good empirical research yet on the economic benefits of Australian Pentecostalism. The great contribution of prosperity preaching is that it “inscribes materiality with spiritual meaning,” to quote Kate Bowler, opening up new possibilities at both individual and corporate levels. Can we resist smug putdowns about the “prosperity gospel” and work together against the perversely pseudo-spiritual tendencies of much contemporary theology and church practice? Paul Oslington is Professor of Economics and Dean of Business, Alphacrucis College, Sydney. This article is based on a presentation at an Alphacrucis College/ Western Sydney University conference.
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OPINION
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JULY 2018
The church is not condemned to live in boxes
John Sandeman on architecture The recipe: take one island, let loose ten international architects to design chapels, build them and maybe create a stir. The Vatican has entered the Venice Architectural Biennale for the first time and its takeover of the island of San Giorgio Maggiore just opposite St Mark’s Square has stirred something. In the 21st century, are our church gatherings trapped in boxes or can we do better? San Giorgio gives an answer – that just as Christians sing, maybe the spaces we sing in can be joyful. Here are five of them. Terunobu Fujimori asks visitors to his chapel “to enter by the narrow gate,” a door that even this thin man feels
Javier Corvalan’s cross and circle; Franceso Cellini’s Bible lectern; looking through Norman Foster’s lattice; Sean Godsell’s cool tower.
the need to twist to enter. The door lies between hewn tree trunks which invites us into a traditional church shape. Inside, a large wooden cross and the beams play off each other. “Maybe it is only in Japan,” he writes, “but it seems that when the people think about Christianity, the cross comes first to mind.” Fujimori’s very traditional chapel, which could take a church plant tomorrow, is a reminder that Australian Christians have become oddly shy about crosses on their churches. Terunobu Fujimori’s narrow door Javier Corvalan
from Spain has also made a cross the centre of his chapel; this time a three-dimensional cross that reads from anywhere within a tilted cylinder that circles it. The cylinder rises like a spaceship – this strips the idea of chapel to a meeting around a cross. It is not really a building, more a gesture. The lone Australian, Sean Godsell, provides an outdoorsy space with a sophisticated metal tower rising from a metal table. (That will upset both Catholics and Protestant traditionalists.) The hollow tower is lined inside in a golden hue – which is an invitation to look up during communion. This looks like a pop-up affair that could be used for summer beach missions; there are benches for
people to gather quite informally, and the bottom of the tower hinges up for shelter. Norman Foster, from the UK, best known in Australia for several temples of commerce in glass and steel, turns to timber and a Gothic geometry to meet the San Giorgio chapel challenge. Steel supports form the cross in your mind’s eye as you walk through. Plants are growing up the timber lattice on either side. In time, this will end up as a green mini-cathedral. Good for gathering on a summer’s day, another one suitable for beach missions. Is the podium at the end a table or a stage? You decide. The slickest chapel comes from Francesco Cellini, a self-conscious unbeliever who has tried for a
stripped-down space, without religious meaning. But like a couple of other projects, it does provide for one major element, with a sculptural lectern shaped like a book. The Bible hovers in this minimalist space. The Sydney Anglican, Phillip Jensen, had a good point when he described his St Andrew’s Cathedral (of which he was Dean for ten years) as a “rain shelter.” (Several of these chapels even fail this test.) Jensen wanted people to be clear they needed to avoid venerating buildings. But San Giorgio shows that churches can be bright and fun, and too contemporary to be holy. The Venice Architecture Biennale will finish on November 25.
Serving the widows and orphans of today
Katherine Thompson on walking with the vulnerable The book of James tells us that, “religion that is pure and undefiled before God, the Father, is this: to care for orphans and widows in their distress, and to keep oneself unstained by the world” (James 1:27). I wonder if we often skip over these words and read it as meaning we need to be nice people and not get caught up in things that are obviously ungodly in our culture. Perhaps this is precisely where we go wrong, as it is less costly to be a Pharisee than it is to get our hands dirty and actually meet someone at the point of their emotional, physical and social need. We miss the most vulnerable in our Australian society because they do not take the biblical form of orphans and widows. To understand what James is referring to we need to understand that to become a widow in New
Testament Israel was a social, economic and cultural tragedy. It often meant a marginal existence and a life of poverty without the protection of the patriarchal society. The widow needed to provide for her children, work and pay off any debts that her husband left. She was vulnerable to losing any property left for her to care for and to being exploited by other people. She suffered the loss and grief of her distressing and lonely situation, possibly estranged from her husband’s family . Jesus warned the Jews that they deserved punishment if they were exploiting these widows by cheating them out of their homes while at the same time appearing pious in saying lengthy prayers in public (Mark 12:40). Jesus also clearly states that when we help the vulnerable in our society, the sick, the hungry, the imprisoned and homeless we are actually ministering for him (Matt 25:3140). Similarly, the New Testament church recognised the need to care for the widows in their community and chose seven men who were “known to be full of the Spirit and wisdom” (Acts 6:3), to care for them, in order to free up the apostles for prayer and the ministry of the word. We certainly still have widows in our society but the cultural, social and legal ramifications are different from those stated in Scripture. Widows are generally older women, and they are welcome in church and mostly
retain the support and protection of their family, friends and community. While it remains our collective responsibility to care for these women, their vulnerability is often not as extreme as what occurred in New Testament times. I would like to argue that the church needs to rethink the application of this scripture in James 1:27 and extend its protection to include all vulnerable women and children who are marginalised and facing social, economic and cultural exclusion. We are naive and blind if we think exclusion does not occur within our church community, never mind in our wider Australian society. Yet, as a woman who attends church, and who works with people who are struggling with the consequences of adversity, I hear too many people lamenting how followers of Christ offer judgment and do nothing to meet their actual needs. We find it easier to turn a blind eye than stand against a husband who has been unfaithful. We say there is always fault on both sides, but this can be one of those justifications that contains only a small element of truth. The deception of infidelity causes family breakdown and has longlasting, multigenerational financial and emotional consequences. We fail to stand in solidarity with victims of abuse. Child abuse is too hard to face and we don’t wish to believe the worst of someone and realise they have
been physically and emotionally mistreating their family. We justify our lack of response by saying that the perpetrator appears to be a person of upright character, not realising that our failure to listen to the victim isolates them and implies they are lying. The silence this forces upon them can be equally as painful and destructive as the original abuse. Silencing is a form of social exclusion. We pass judgment when a single mother is living in poverty with her children and is stressed and distressed. We choose to think the worst rather than see that she is trying her best under very difficult circumstances. We tell her children that their mother must not be a real Christian if she is divorced or unmarried, or worse still we write her off as having loose morals. We have a social blind spot when it comes to recognising the value of single women in our church community. They feel rejected because they are not wives or mothers. Married men can make them feel like an uncomfortable threat, like they are unsafe to be around, when all they want is to be accepted as a valued individual. Surely if the book of Job teaches us anything, it is to get alongside people who are suffering and listen rather than taking the easier option of judging or giving advice. We need to genuinely love other people, and show it by being willing to walk with them in their distress, and support in every area of their life. Jesus lived
this kind of life, eating with tax collectors and sinners, and shows us an example of how to be in the world and not become “stained” by it. Unfortunately the church is not untouched by sexual immorality, child abuse, domestic violence, social exclusion and sexism. All women and children who profess a faith in Christ should be welcomed into our community with love and understanding. They need to be taken seriously. They need to be safe and able to trust. When we fail to be Christ to them they will leave our doors and possibly wonder why they were not loved and whether God even loves them as we could not. We are at fault if we only want a sanitised church community that welcomes the Pharisees who look like fine moral people while ignoring the distressed, lonely, marginalised and socially outcast. We are also blind to the emotional and spiritual consequences of the hurt we are causing Christian women and children who are living in these difficult circumstances. If we cannot love and support the vulnerable in the church, we will certainly struggle to offer more than superficial care for people who do not know Christ. Dr Katherine Thompson works as a Mental Health Social Worker in private practice in Melbourne, Victoria. She works with youth aged 12-25 years old, and missions organisations and their staff. She is the author of Christ Centred Mindfulness due out mid 2018.
OPINION
JULY 2018
Natasha Moore on exhilarating reality We all know what a dramatic difference it can make how we look at things. Hamlet famously mopes to Rosencrantz that both the good earth and the breathtaking heavens have lost their lustre for him: “it goes so heavily with my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory … this brave o’erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours.” His fellow humans, too, seem strangely diminished. He knows that, objectively, humanity is pretty remarkable – “What a piece of work is man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! … the beauty of the world! the paragon of animals!” – but looking on himself and others with a jaded eye, all Hamlet sees is “this quintessence of dust.” Competing accounts of what humans are and what we exist for swirl around us. There’s the Freudian self, neurotic and in need primarily of psychological management – or the self of evolutionary psychology, its every behaviour accounted for in terms of survival value or the pressure to find a mate – or the curated self of social media – just for starters. Whether we think of our species as a freak accident of nature, a machine to be optimised, or a huge extended family will matter a lot for how we direct our energies and what we count as success or happiness. Christians have their own versions of these disagreements. Some conceive of the world as a sinking ship, their urgent role on deck as getting as many people as possible into lifeboats – saving souls. Others see their
Why are we here
task as bringing both culture and the political order under the influence of Christ and/or Christian principles. Yet others are convinced that Christians should be communities set apart from the mess of the world, witnessing to an alternative way of being. And some are just doing their best to carve out a balanced, workable, preferably pleasant life, with a bit of service and evangelism thrown in. Most of us, most of the time, are too absorbed in the concerns of our daily round – work, family, life admin, a bit of leisure time – to articulate to ourselves the point of it all, what our efforts really add up to. The question of “the meaning of life” has become almost an embarrassing cliché – something for undergrads to ponder as they sip their long blacks before going on to actually do something with their lives. The release of two very different books with very similar titles, then, is refreshing. Both Marilynne Robinson’s latest book of essays, What Are We Doing Here?, and John Stackhouse’s Why You’re Here: Ethics for the Real World unabashedly devote themselves to perhaps the biggest question of existence: What is it to be human? All else – right and wrong, possible and impossible, purpose and responsibility – flows from this. Stackhouse, a Canadian academic, addresses himself specifically to the Christian, Robinson to a secular and literary readership, but both take an overtly theological approach. Both caution against the wellintentioned attempts of thinkers such as Peter Singer and animal rights organisations such as PETA to efface the distinction between humans and other creatures,
reaffirming the unique brilliance, the capacities and duties, and also the destructiveness of our kind. This defence of human exceptionalism is an ongoing project for Robinson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist. Her crystalline and often wry prose has the effect of seeming simply to point out what is blindingly obvious. “There is no disputing the fact that we human beings have abilities not found in other animals, for example, the ability to split atoms,” she writes in her previous volume, The Givenness of Things: “In some quarters it is considered modest and seemly for us to take our place among the animals, conceptually speaking – to acknowledge finally the bonds of kinship evolution implies. Yet … it seems fair to wonder if the beasts, given a voice in the matter, would not feel a bit insulted by our intrusion. History is the great unfinished portrait of old Adam. In the very fact of having a history we are unique. And when we look at it we are astonished. Only in myth or nightmare could another such creature be found. What a thing is man.” Robinson is clear-eyed about our proneness to error and to harm; her preferred theme, though, is the sheer marvellousness of the human mind, “that luxuriant flowering of the highest possibilities of the material world.” We are not separate from what we call the natural world, but we have to discount an awful lot of what we experience, as well as what
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we make happen in the world, to convince ourselves (in the vein of much contemporary neuroscience) that consciousness is a mere byproduct of the organic matter of our brains. Stackhouse’s focus in Why You’re Here is on the particular role humans have been assigned within creation. The first command the Bible records God giving to humankind, he notes, is to multiply and to tend the world: “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground” (Genesis 1:28). This commission, often referred to as the “creation mandate” or “cultural mandate,” gets a bad rap in some quarters because of how badly we have so often performed it, plundering the earth instead of drawing out its astonishing potential. But our failures, Stackhouse insists, don’t give us permission to throw up our hands and retire from the stage. He quotes cultural commentator Andy Crouch on the inescapability of human exceptionalism: “In the whole known universe we are the only species that takes responsibility for the others; the only species that demonstrates the slightest interest in naming, tending, and conserving the others; that indeed is accountable for the stewardship of others; and the only species that feels guilty (however fitfully and hypocritically) when its stewardship fails.” Stackhouse describes the task of human beings on earth – every single one of us – as “maximising shalom,” bringing about what he calls “global flourishing”: “Usually translated ‘peace,’ shalom means not only something negative – ‘no war or conflict of any kind’ – but also something wonderfully positive: the flourishing of all things. This flourishing is not only of each individual thing – each human being, yes, and also each animal, tree, landscape, and waterway – but also of each relationship among individuals, each group that individuals form, each relationship among groups or between groups and individuals, and the whole of creation in loving harmony with God.” There is plenty here to be getting on with. And Stackhouse is emphatic that, while the Great Commission – the task of “making disciples of all nations” that Jesus entrusts to his followers in Matthew 28:18-20 – is a crucial calling for Christians, it cannot be
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all the church does. Salvation is not purely an end in itself but part of God’s plan for shalom for his world. There will be no “Christians” in heaven: “we are humans first and last,” writes Stackhouse, “and ‘Christians’ only temporarily.” And the claim of the Bible is that the task of cultivating our world and ourselves will continue – free of the thorns and thistles of our current experience, free of frustration, exploitation, absurdity, and waste – in the promised new heavens and new earth. Why You’re Here wades dauntlessly into what that looks like for political engagement, for art and sport, for war and peace and science. In particular, it looks pragmatically but with firm hope at what it means to work side by side with people who think very differently from ourselves to bring about piecemeal and messy but real shalom in our fractured, fractious, but overwhelmingly fruitful world. Both Why You’re Here and What Are We Doing Here? are full of riches and restless with energy to know, perceive, and accomplish more, together. Both do the reader a service in drawing our attention away from the ceaseless stream of the everyday-urgent to a reality that is larger, more breathable, more demanding, and more exhilarating. There is always a larger scale, and by God’s grace, a place for our apparently puny efforts within it. Robinson updates Hamlet’s “goodly frame” and “brave o’erhanging firmament” with the insights of contemporary astrophysics, calling us to wonder, to worship, and to work: “Yes, we cannot resist the pull of gravity, and no, we cannot really take in the fact that our cluster of galaxies is flying at 392,000 miles per second toward something called the Great Attractor, driven in part by pressure from an expanding void. Reality on its grandest scale bears no analogy to daily life here on our singular, weather-swaddled little earth. But there it is, and here we are, the great rush of the cosmos silent and impalpable to us. And within our starry calm exotic things can flourish that are unimaginable without it – history, memory, hope and doubt, love and loss, good and evil … this earth is so minor an exception to the generality of things that it is insignificant in any account of the universe, unless, of course, it is the very quintessence of significance.” Natasha Moore is a Research Fellow at the Centre for Public Christianity. Visit www. publicchristianity.org
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OPINION
14
JULY 2018
What I learned from potatoes
Lucy Gichuhi had a very special mother pixabay / Couleur
Recently, we celebrated Mothers’ Day. No matter which nation or culture we came from, there is something special about all mothers. Many mothers are biological; some adoptive. Others are social mothers. The vital role of a mother is undeniable. The story of my mother is the story of many mothers. As long as I can remember, Mum was our primary carer. She was a teen-mum when I was born, and I cannot imagine how overwhelming this must have been for her. Mum walked many miles to fetch drinking water for the family among all the activities of daily living. She had no nannies or house-help; it was all up to her. Every year, mum had a newborn baby. She was always pregnant or nursing a young one. I was 10 years old when my seventh sibling, a sister, was born. This makes me
marvel at the strength of a mother. A mother of three daughters myself, I cannot even remotely imagine how my mother managed. Mum taught us manners, caring for others, balancing our emotions and the value of hard work. Chores such as sweeping the dirt floor of our house, caring for younger siblings, milking cows, or fetching water from the river, were to be done cheerfully and meticulously. Mum taught us to care for and respect each other. She had no favourites; all of us were equal in her eyes. Mum also taught us financial
discipline using the “Potato Principle.” When we worked in the garden, the potato crop was divided into three portions: 1) One third was used to produce more potatoes. 2) One third was dedicated for sale. 3) One third was used to eat. This principle was used to live for the present, make money, and move forward for the future by always protecting a portion. She also ensured I opened my first bank account. Mum made sure we picked good friends. She carefully guided me in creating a social life of dignity and
integrity. Mum ensured we were politically aware, even though most women had to do as they were told by the men in their lives. Throughout my schooling, I experienced Mum nurture us, help with homework, run the farm, and train her growing family to positively contribute to society. Mum was a teacher, counsellor and provider. These were all part of her DNA. Motherhood is a training ground for personal and public leadership, even if we don’t realise it yet. Her final piece of advice, just before she died in 2013, was, “Vote more women into politics; that’s the only way you can change the world.” This was when none of her daughters were in politics. Growing up, I learnt the story of the other mother in my life – Grandma. She, too, nurtured my developing leadership skills. Grandmothers, like mothers, do the same work – only with the benefit of hindsight. She brought food, love and laughter that only a grandmother can. Many times, in the small house she shared with her goats, she told us how women shape the community by caring for their families and raising their children to be all they can be. Mum and Grandma taught me I had the strength to do anything I wanted. My dignity as a woman and a mother is worth fighting for. Integrity, hard work and respect for others pave the way to be all that one was created to be. Mum and Grandma taught me my deep-rooted beliefs. They
taught me forgiveness. Grandma died having never talked about her own painful past or explaining how she came to be divorced. In a culture where polygamy and other women-degrading practices were practised, she taught us to remove ourselves from danger if need be. In her home, she told us wonderful stories and I fondly remember much laughter. She taught us discipline. That’s what mothers do; they are leaders in their homes, business, community or politics. Leadership is deeply embedded in all mothers. My heart goes out to the mothers who are overwhelmed and struggling in one way or another. Hang in there; a new dawn is rising. As a mother of three daughters, I realised I was raising leaders for their homes, business, community and nation. They would learn by watching what I did. I am the person to teach them how to be the best leaders who will contribute positively to our society. You see, girls can only learn some things from watching the women in their lives. Grandma taught me that negative emotions such as anger, frustration and bitterness make you lose all your viable options. Teaching and modelling for our children is a mother’s noblest task. A mother’s integral responsibility is to mentor and develop the next generation of leaders. Lucy Gichuhi is a Liberal senator for South Australia.
God’s Sabbath can be inside all of us
Tim Costello on rest for the soul Early in the Bible, we are told something vital about the
rhythms of God, the universe and everything else. It comes simply and powerfully in Genesis 2: “By the seventh day God had finished the work he had been doing; so on the seventh day he rested from all his work. Then God blessed the seventh day and made it holy, because on it he rested from all the work of creating that he had done.” From that stems the commandment given to the Hebrews – You must honour the Sabbath and keep it holy. Sabbath is about more than external rest for the body; it is about inner rest of the soul.
It is in the Sabbath that we are gifted with the weekly reminder of eternal rest to come and of the heavenly kingdom on Earth. And within the Sabbath we are reminded of selah – the word that appears 71 times in the Psalms and calls us to “reflect on this”; to ponder the big questions and listen to wisdom in the silence. Quiet and reflective hearts seem rare these days. Many of us say life moves too fast. It’s as if we were made for clocks rather than vice versa. That’s why we have instant coffee, instant gratification, instant replay in a world dominated by instant access
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and smartphones. Is it not quiet wisdom that humanity needs? We generally fear silence, filling in the gaps between speech with background television or music; anything to avoid the awkward silence. The irony is that it is in silence where we are mostly likely to hear God. Psalm 46:10 states: “Be still, and know that I am God.” Being still reminds us that God is in control, and we are called to simply listen and reflect. Perhaps that’s why we avoid the reflective silence – it’s confronting. It seems God cannot be easily seen or heard in weekday noise and
restlessness and we need a quiet place to touch our souls. Jesus retreated alone into the desert for 40 days and nights before starting his mission. He frequently headed away from the crowds to find some solitude and peace just to pray. Sabbath reflection can lead us to the place of contemplation where we can find ourselves and our loving God. This week, I’m taking some time to pause, reflect and listen; and I want to encourage you to do the same. The Sabbath is surely a sign of the hope that we have in the world to come. Selah.
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OPINION
JULY 2018
15
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Love for enemies Michael Jensen on true forgiveness I don’t think there’s any more difficult part of Christian discipleship than finding what it means to love your enemies, and then actually doing it. We cannot sidestep this call. It’s what Jesus clearly teaches. It’s what Jesus himself models. And yet … it is so darned hard. Take these real life (disguised) situations: Phoebe is in the middle of a bitter divorce. Her husband has tried to prove that she is mentally unstable and is busy hiding their assets. There is a real possibility that she will be unable to see her kids. In fact, her husband’s new girlfriend is turning the kids against her. He’s also been openly mocking her faith in front of them and painting her as a religious fanatic. John has recently discovered the reason why his career has stalled. A work colleague has been undermining him to management and even to clients. Now that he knows, John has had to start seeing a psychologist. He’s been moody and distracted at home, and his wife thinks their marriage is in trouble. The strata committee at Frances’ block of units is locked in a bitter dispute about renovations. There’s a group of residents who are trying to force her to leave. It’s become deeply unpleasant to encounter her neighbours in the lobby – there are under-thebreath comments about her being a stingy old lady. Threatening anonymous letters have been slipped under her door. What might it mean for Phoebe, John, and Frances to practise enemy love? When we think of love for enemies, we normally imagine scenes less ordinary. And yet, here, in the midst of everyday life, we find enemies – not just people we
dislike, but people who wish to do us harm. When Jesus taught us: “love your enemies” he had in mind specifically the enemies that we gain through being his disciples. There are those who will be determined to destroy the people of God. There are those who encounter Christ-like behaviour as a deep offence to the way things should be, and want it eradicated from the earth. But that is not our only experience of enmity. As the disciples of Christ, we are called on to love our enemies – whether they are specifically attacking us for our faith or not. When we are sitting amid an experience of being hated, everything within us cries out for vengeance. When we are under assault and our livelihood and even our identity are under attack, what are we to do? It not only seems impossible to think of loving our neighbour, it actually seems unnatural. Our enemies wish to conquer and destroy us, to leave us vanquished. To survive, we should return their enmity. Shouldn’t we? When Jesus teaches his disciples to love their enemies, however, he is not giving them a cute or romantic piece of advice. Love for enemies is in the first place based in the character of God. Jesus says: Love your enemies … so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun to rise on the evil and on the good … be perfect therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect. Love your enemies, in other words, because that is exactly what God does. He showers his providential care upon those who love him and upon those who ignore and even hate him. They receive his kindness, whether they regard him or not. A special sun does not shine on those who love God, leaving all the God-haters in deep darkness. It shines alike on all. Jesus might have gone on to speak of God’s redemptive love, too. In Romans 5, Paul speaks of God’s particular love for us in that “while we were still his enemies” Christ died for the ungodly. The death of Jesus was the ultimate act of enemy love. He offered himself not while we were in the midst of turning to him, or because we had somehow shown that we had a spark of love for him.
On the contrary. That’s the love of the pagans, says Jesus, to love those who love you. Who doesn’t? And so, here’s the central thing about enemy love. We love our enemies because as enemies we were loved. Dietrich Bonhoeffer said that the Christian disciple’s behaviour “must be determined not by the way others treat him, but by the treatment he himself receives from Jesus.” And how have we been treated? We have been loved even in our hostility and rebellion against him. We’ve received grace and mercy, even as we were ungrateful and unkind. That is who the disciples of Christ are. They call God their Father, undeservingly. They know the sweet taste of forgiveness. Like the prodigal Son, they have come home to a Father they once wished was dead to find his welcoming embrace. Thus, we do not look at our enemies and calculate how they’ve hurt us and how we can return the hurt in kind. We remember Christ – and that is the basis for how we approach our enemy. But does that mean I have to let my enemy win? Do I lay down passively and allow their hatred free rein? I think we get confused because we forget what love actually means. We are so obsessed with allowing people their individual choices that we think that loving someone means letting them have what they want. Not at all. Bonhoeffer says: “The will of God … is that men should defeat their enemies by loving them”. To love your enemy is not to concede everything to them. Jesus did not do that. If love is truly wanting the good of the other person, then loving your enemy is not letting them revel in their dishonesty or hatred. It’s not loving them to allow them to keep on doing evil, to you or anyone else. Love says “no” as well as “yes.” It is firm but kind. It makes space for a person to repent, while at the same time letting them know that there is something of which to repent. We do not condone the enemy’s evil by loving them. That is our great fear. We imagine that if we do not return hatred towards hatred, if we do not wish to destroy those who wish to destroy us, then we are even in collusion with our destroyer.
Forgiveness is often misunderstood in this way. If we forgive, are we not allowing justice itself to collapse? Not at all. True forgiveness – one example of loving one’s enemy – speaks honestly. It actually judges and condemns evil, or evil is not truly forgiven and the enemy not truly loved. In this way, the enemy is actually conquered. As disciples of Christ, we show ourselves protected by the love of God for us. We experience hatred, but we need not fear its destructive power. We have a blessed freedom that the enemy does not know. Our enemies expect us to cower in fear, or to retaliate in kind. But we are the disciples of a resurrected Lord! We choose neither. We speak the truth and we hope in Christ. So what could this mean for our experiences of having enemies? First of all, I think it is vital that we understand we are not talking about those against whom we feel enmity. Perhaps we are the enemy of others. It could be that the hatred has begun in our hearts, and not in theirs. Let it not be so! But what about those who are destroying us? Our abusers? Our implacable opponents? The workplace bullies who have caused us mental health problems? We love them not by ignoring their evil behaviour but because of Christ’s love for us. But how? There’s no pamphlet of instructions on this. Jesus doesn’t give us a step-by-step programme to enemy-love. I think we simply have to ask in each situation: What does it mean to love my enemy here? What can I do to serve them, so that they are vanquished by the love of God which is in me? How that works is up to you. But if you
know you are safe in God, you can act with daring and surprise. Change the game. A friend of mine who works in prison chaplaincy recently told me a story. The inmate “Ben”, who ran the Christian group in one of the wings of the prison, was also the chief sweeper – a position of responsibility within the wing. The daily prayer and Bible group in the wing had grown to about 40 per cent of the inmates. Ben made a rule if you got into a fight you couldn’t come to group for a week. But another group of inmates wanted to take control. So they started petty thieving from the other inmates. Now, usually, if that happens, the group in charge puts the thieves in hospital, or their authority is gone. So what was Ben to do? Do nothing, and seem weak? Or organise violent retaliation, when he’d been speaking against it as a Christian? My friend said: “I had no idea how to advise him to act Christianly in this situation. But he figured it out. One morning he stood up with the other Christian leaders and said, ‘there has been thieving, and I will not have it. Here are ten fellas who all get the full buy-up every week. If anyone needs something, anything, we will give it to you, no questions asked. But you will not steal anymore.’ It was startling. He won the influence in the wing, even won a bunch of the other guys over. They handed the thieves over and they were removed with no violence.” That’s what love for enemy means. And that’s what it can do. Michael Jensen is the rector of St Mark’s Anglican Church in Darling Point, Sydney, and the author of several books.
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OPINION
16
JULY 2018
The powerful unfairness of grace
Greg Clarke Nothing in life is fair. Nothing at all. There is no balance, no ledger, no tit-for-tat, no yin-yang. Unfairness is the way of the world: injustice, inhumanity, imbalance. Which is why the rule of grace is the best strategy for how the world might work best. Without grace, we are stuck with the law as our only way to make an attempt at justice. We establish laws to restrain evil behaviour and punish it, set wise guidelines, and promote what is good, carrot-andstick style. But it doesn’t really work, because everyone is not on an even playing field to start with. As cynical French writer Anatole France wrote, “The law, in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal bread”. One person (let’s call him Larry) is born into poverty, another (Harry) into royalty. Nothing fair
about that. Neither did anything to “deserve” their circumstances. Life is just like that. Unfair. For life to work out well, both Larry and Harry will have to live by grace. This is a huge challenge for both of them. The impoverished Larry cannot reasonably expect that life will turn around, although if he has been blessed with skill, health and opportunity, his circumstances may change. But that, too, is unfair. What about the poor person who doesn’t have these blessings? And likewise, the regally born Harry has to see the unfairness of his circumstances: the concentration of wealth, the history of oppression (that’s how royalty comes about, let’s be honest), and the nearly limitless power. These are profoundly unfair, and seeing them as such is surely the key to living well as a royal. “I do not deserve this,” should be Harry’s first thought every morning and last at night. This realisation was the turning point for Siddhartha Guatama (the Buddha), who according to legend became increasingly aware of the poverty and suffering outside his life of privilege behind palace walls. The Buddha’s response was quietism – lower your expectations, retreat from desire and hope, live a meditative life. But the Christian response is grace – seek the good
of others, prefer them to yourself, overcome the world’s unfairness through love. In the midst of unfairness, the Christian is to accept it for himself, but not for others. That’s what grace looks like. When governments face social issues, they are always hamstrung by the unfairness of the world. Social security laws attempt to treat everyone fairly, but end up being so complicated that those who need them most can’t access them. The horrifying scenes at the US/Mexico border, as I write, are another instance where the law of the land just doesn’t seem to reflect what most people would call fair. Because fairness is elusive and doesn’t work as a way of being in community. Only grace works. This is all the more important because we individuals have limited information about how life will pan out for us. As academic and professional poker player Annie Duke stresses in her fascinating book, Thinking In Bets: Making Smarter Decisions When You Don’t Have All the Facts, life is more like a game of poker than a game of chess. In chess, all the facts are known: winning or losing depends on making the right decision for the best outcome. But life isn’t like that; it’s more like poker, where the future can’t be predicted and there are plenty
of surprises around the corner. Chess is fair; poker is not. At least for those of us not enjoying the allknowing-God point of view. Since life is a bit like poker, you will have to get used to unfairness – bad luck, rotten runs, turns for the worse – even when you make reasonable decisions. It’s how you respond to these circumstances that makes a difference, not whether you win the hand. Fairness will always get trumped by kindness. Equity by grace. Laying down the rules by laying down your privileges. In fact, I think the beloved Aussie “fair go” is less about being fair, and more about showing some grace. Grace can be extremely practical. When you let someone in front of you in the supermarket queue because they have a small baby, that’s grace, and that works. You were there first, but that doesn’t matter. It’s probably unfair that you beat the mum into the queue anyway. Time for grace.
When you donate your time to help at an aged-care home, despite the fact that your time is worth money for most of the week, that’s grace, and it works. When you employ people who might struggle to get work because of their disabilities, that’s grace and it works (actually, it’s good for business, according to Job Access). * If you genuinely believe in fairness for both Larry and Harry, you have to believe in a day of reckoning. That’s the only way fairness can emerge – in the long run, in the final analysis. And only God could possibly know what that will look like. The closest we get to it is in the teachings and sacrifice of Christ, as fine an example as ever graced the earth. “For the law was given through Moses; grace and truth came through Jesus Christ” (John 1:17). Greg Clarke is CEO of Bible Society Australia. * jobaccess.gov.au/employers/benefitsemploying-people-with-disability
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