JustThinking | silence is golden

… but sometimes it’s just plain yellow | Danielle Strickland

T

he days of blogging have un-bottled a generational gab, resulting in random bits of information about everyone’s thought life dribbling out incessantly everywhere. It’s exhausting. While Orwell (1984) suggested information would be locked up and controlled by the state, Huxley (Brave New World) seems to have had it right - the excessive nature of information has led to disinterest and we are dying a slow death of willful ignorance.

In light of this phenomenon, it’s amazing that we can still struggle with the silence of institutions and organizations about injustice. It seems that while all the rage is to blab on incessantly in public, confessing every single thought of personal culpability, the exact opposite is true of corporate entities and churches. Silence is golden, it would seem. And sometimes, it’s just plain yellow.

I’m not sure how long it takes to learn this lesson. How many genocides, unjust wars and corrupt political regimes do we have to live through with consistent embarrassment about our culpability through silence? Besides Bonhoeffer and the small group of confessing churches in Nazi-era Germany, where was the prophetic witness of the church? Is it possible to believe that Christian churches en masse flew the Nazi flag and celebrated Nazi youth awards at Sunday school? Rwanda - where were we? South Africa - the church was the last institution (particularly in the west) to stand up publicly against apartheid - to our shame.

John Smith, an Australian Christian social reformer who wrote the book Sharpening the Cutting Edge, details one of his experiences in the Philippines. While the majority of the local Philippine people were suffering, the Lausanne World Conference of Evangelism was held in the region. Several of the conference leaders denied that those who were speaking out against the unjust political regime were giving any Christian witness.

Meanwhile, John Smith was arrested and sentenced to death (he escaped) for standing with local Philippine pastors in front of bulldozers about to ravish the houses of thousands of peasants for no good reason and with no legal rights. As a result of this incident, the evangelical community hosting the Lausanne Conference publicly denounced him - while holding their conference at the most expensive hotel in the Philippines. They wanted to distance themselves from the “agitators” and assured the Philippine authorities that Christians aren’t political.

Wow.

I suppose it’s difficult to navigate when to speak and what to say and how that will affect the people of our movement and the church in general. I know it is difficult, and yet isn’t it even more difficult to try and maintain a Christian prophetic witness when we’ve had no guts to stand up for the poor? When will we speak publicly against industries that continue to exploit the poor? When will churches and movements and denominations speak publicly against Zimbabwe and the oppression of current political figures? When will we declare that unjust trade practices are evil and wrong and worthy of judgment? Perhaps when we stop benefiting from them? I know it’s complex. I’m not a naïve idealist, just an idealist. But honestly, we need to leave the yellow cowardice of silence that begs God’s judgment upon us and find our voice and speak up for those who can’t speak for themselves.

“What good is salt if it loses its flavour?” God’s kingdom is coming into the world; let’s find our voice to proclaim what that means. Now, that kind of voice is golden - not yellow.

Writer: Capt. Danielle Strickland is currently the Social Justice Director of the Southern Australia Territory. She digs traveling, reading, running, speaking, basketball and movies. Her passion is grace, mercy and justice… and all the stuff in between. Her favourite question is ‘how hard can it be?’ and most of her days are spent answering it.

1 Comment to JustThinking | silence is golden

1. Danielle,

   Today, I fully agree with you!!!!

   I would take it a step further and comment that church in many of these cases wasn’t silent, but actively leading or participating in the injustice. It was the church in general worldwide (with the exception of a few very small minority congregations) who not only supported Hitlers Nazi movement, but actually handed people over to the Nazis and the death camps - knowing full well what they were (the current Pope at the time was a member of the elite Hitler youth, who were hand-picked for their loyalty to the ideals of the Nazi movement and fed into the SS). As I understand, even the Salvation Army, from the pulpit, publically supported Hitler and his ideals at the time. I could mention the inquisitions, and the support the church gave to the slave movement, and to the opposition it gave to equality of all races and gender, and to the active opposition and oppression it still gives (including the Salvation Army) to many peoples today. This isn’t the church being silent, this is the church actively participating in and perpetrating injustice.

   As I have often said, the church has (even today) been one of the main perpetrators of injustice. We need to not just find a voice, but understand what injustice is. This will be very difficult for the church in general because it will lead to the church being challenged on what is right and wrong. There are the ‘odd’ christians dotted here and there who do have it right, and who do stand up for what is right, but these are so few you could not say that the church understands what injustice is, or even what right and wrong are.

   Yours in Christ,
   Graeme.
Graeme Randall on June 8th, 2009

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