Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Patriotism and Discipleship--choices we have


Further reflection on the Jeremiah Wright flap, from a left-leaning democrat, but not about partisan politics. This is about how we parse our values of patriotism and Christian discipleship as church leaders and how our folks respond to our choices.
Hillary is quoted in the NYTimes this morning as saying: "Given all we have heard and seen, he (Wright) would not have been my pastor." She is further quoted as critiquing Obama: "While we don't have a choice when it comes to our relatives, we do have a choice when it comes to our pastors or our church."
The assumption in that last quote is a common one. Christianity is a voluntary activity. We make choices to join churches or leave churches or not go to church at all based on our private values and prejudices. One of our favorite prejudices leveraged against our churches and our pastors is patriotism. I've been reminded frequently as a pastor, and I'll be you have too, that we are not free to criticize our country or our president because that's mixing church and state.
I've always felt that I owe a higher allegiance to the God of Jesus Christ than I do to my country, and I'm a kind of American heretic because of it, I know. I am frankly shocked that Americans are criticizing Jeremiah Wright for mining the scriptures for God's priorities and using those scriptural insights to criticize the priorities of the government.
Hillary's comment also reminded me that prominent church members and community leaders are not above using their celebrity and their clout (and their contributions to the church) as a threat to domesticate the clergy. "If you say something I don't agree with, I'll leave this church and tell everyone why."
I personally believe Christians are called to a higher standard of behavior. Of course we are free to disagree with our pastors, but we're not free to reject the demands of the gospel to put God first!

Context in Preaching--Jeremiah Wright's critics


The seminary had a forum last week, organized by students, to talk about the flap caused by those who cherry-picked Rev. Jeremiah Wright's sermons for so called sensational clips and then tried to tie the Democratic candidate Obama to them. Our homiletics professor, Dr. Debra Mumford, pointed out that they not only took these clips out of context from the whole sermons and from their scriptural basis (Wright is a completely biblical preacher, by the way), but they also took him out of the context of preaching in a black church, out of the context of the black prophetic preaching tradition, and out of the context of black liberation theology. She also suggested that she could find nothing untrue in what was quoted by Wright--an important distinction!
I thought that the mostly white students in the crowd needed to think, as well, about how they approach public issues in their preaching in the context of mainline, European-American, middle-class congregations. Here is what I wrote in response.

In my 35 years of preaching to mostly middle and upper-middle class European American Presbyterians, I engaged in a very different kind of prophetic proclamation. I think Wright and I may use similar hermeneutic principles, but it did not look or sound anything like what he does. With my congregations, I listened carefully with ear and heart and mind to the culture and existential concerns of my congregation (as Wright did at Trinity UCC) and the historical situation in which we lived. Then I shaped the prophetic messages to work into their particular hearts and minds. I did not usually overtly challenge or criticize their compliance and collaboration with the dominant culture that oppressed others. The reason for that is that I had learned that they could not hear hope and gospel for themselves or for others if they closed their ears to the prophetic message. That’s similar to the mental processes we observe in commentators and news anchors and others who wont’ or can’t really hear Jeremiah Wright’s messages.

The other thing that I did in my congregations that is parallel to Wright—I let them know in as many ways as possible that I loved them, and helped them learn to trust me. After a while, they also became more open to my prophetic proclamation because it came in the context of trust and love. Each of us has to measure how long to let that trust build in a particular congregation before turning up the pressure in prophetic preaching.

With reading the context and building trust, over the years I learned to frame the gospel and the prophetic message in ways that would open their hearts and minds to the possibility of inner transformation for themselves and compassion and commitment to others, particularly to those on the margins. This was not always fruitful, but I kept at it. Frequently they thought I was “making them think” which is white folks’ way of struggling with these issues, and that was OK with them. They also knew, because I repeated it often, that they were not required to agree with me. As good Presbyterians they were required, instead, to come to grips with the scripture passages, listen to my proclamation, examine their own conscience, and arrive at their own conclusions. Thus I could do prophetic preaching that fit the time and place, in my own particular way.
It's all about the context!

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Watching Clinton and Obama turning on each other in a kind of pit-bull fight to the end reminded me of Dr. Ken Goodpaster, Professor of Business Ethics at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul MN, with whom I worked doing ethics training for high school students, and who coined the term "teleopathy." The theologically trained might catch the roots of the words--it means "goal sickness." It is described in his new book Conscience and Corporate Culture, just out from Blackwell. (See a review at:
A leader afflicted with teleopathy gets so fixated on a goal, such as winning a presidential nomination, that ethics and values are lost in the battle. He says this fixation or addiction is accompanied by distancing from one's humanity, and a rationalization that loses touch with reality. What makes this pathology so insidious is that one can easily slip over the cliff from a healthy and effective striving for excellence, with its virtues of courage, determination and perseverance. When the goal becomes more important than the people and the systems with which we are working, we're in danger.
Church leaders need to be inoculated against the disease of teleopathy because we drink the water of divine vocation and work in stained-glass environments. When you're doing God's work, it's easy to get so zealous that being right and achieving our goals are more important than the Holy One whom we are supposed to be serving. The inoculations take different forms, but my favorite is a veil of humility that holds my own limitations in front of me, and a good dose of relativity to cast doubt that I've got the final and best take on the situation.
Holy Spirit, give me courage, determination and perseverance, without pathological fixation.

Wednesday, March 5, 2008

New Source for Presbyterian and Ecumenical Studies at Louisville Seminary


President Dean K. Thompson announced yesterday the appointment of The Rev. Dr. Clifton Kirkpatrick as Visiting Professor of Ecumenical Studies and Global Ministries at Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary.

Kirkpatrick, who is currently stated clerk of the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), is also the president of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches. He serves on the governing boards of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., the World Council of Churches, and the Council of Presidents, United States Chapter of the World Conference on Religion and Peace.

The announcement was made during the “Voices of the Church Dinner,” which was held March 4 in conjunction with Louisville Seminary’s annual Festival of Theology and Alum Reunion. Kirkpatrick was the guest speaker.

In September 2007, Kirkpatrick announced that he would not seek a fourth three-year term as stated clerk in the 2.3-million-member denomination. In a published statement addressed to friends and colleagues, he cited a desire for “more quality time with my family, to be able to devote myself more fully to the responsibility I have undertaken since 2004 to serve as president of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches, and to share in the life of the church, both locally and globally, in new and creative ways.”

Kirkpatrick’s term as stated clerk will conclude at the end of the 218th General Assembly (2008) in San Jose, Calif., in June. He was first elected to the office in 1996 and is only the second General Assembly stated clerk elected since Presbyterian reunion in 1983.

At Louisville Seminary, Kirkpatrick will teach up to two courses per year in areas of his expertise, including the ecumenical church, Presbyterian studies, the global church, Presbyterian polity and governance, congregational leadership and ministry, and practical theology.

“We at Louisville Seminary are deeply grateful for Cliff Kirkpatrick's wise, humble, and unselfish service in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and among ecumenical and Reformed communities throughout the world. We look forward to his new and promising relationship with our dedicated faculty and students,” stated President Thompson.
Kirkpatrick’s appointment will run three years and will also allow him to offer his services in Doctor of Ministry degree seminars and in Lifelong Learning events, which address the ecumenical and global church, middle governing body leadership, and church leadership.
Kirkpatrick said he will welcome the opportunity for interaction and conversation with faculty and students and of becoming an active member of the Louisville Seminary community.
Kirkpatrick will be a great resource for pastors, denominational officers and other church leaders for continuing education, for independent studies, and for general counsel drawing on his extensive experience in mission, governance, and interfaith and ecumenical relations.
I'm looking forward to having him around as a colleague! Welcome, Cliff!