I was a teenage fundamentalist - #11

Barry Gittins asks us what we mean when we plot out ‘the end of the book’.

Happy, sad, good, bad - new or trad?

I

n Monty Python’s The Meaning of Life (shot and released in 1983, when I was 15) we followed a hapless French waiter down streets and lanes with the now-ubiquitous one-shot to camera.

His philosophy? ‘The world is a beautiful place. You must go into it and love everyone. Try to make everyone happy, and bring peace and contentment everywhere you go. And so I became a waiter…. Well, it’s not much of a philosophy I know, but well…’

I laughed my head off in stunned surprise at the Frenchman’s anguished, voluble and abusive conclusion to his homespun wisdom (the F-bomb was a fairly novel weapon for comedians back then). The waiter intuits that his belief is rejected by we, the audience, as inadequate - his angry defence suggests that both he and we know there is more to the tale of ‘life’.

As a teenager I had the luxury of time; I could study, grow and learn. I also exhibited the more-than-occasional arrogance of youth.  At the risk of repeating that youthful presumption, not an unprecedented occurrence, I have to say that the closing phrase of our 11th doctrine strikes me now as arrogant in itself.

‘We believe,’ the doctrine states, ‘in the immortality of the soul; in the resurrection of the body; in the general judgment at the end of the world; in the eternal happiness of the righteous; and in the endless punishment of the wicked.’

Most people I have spoken with about spiritual matters in my life, be they Christians or Jews, Muslims, agnostics (and even some rather confused atheists), Buddhists or New Agers, believe that there is an essential element to us - the spark that drives our bodies, the breath of life that gives us hope, sentience, laughter, joy and deep, existential pain.

What do you believe? When it comes to resurrected carcasses, do we get zapped back into existence or do we trade up? Most Christians I know who live within The Salvation Army’s tradition don’t express a belief in bodily resurrection. What was a matter of deep significance to the early Church does not seem to be of great merit to 21st century Christians.

Many bereaved Salvationists of my acquaintance rarely or never return to the graveside of their partner, or the place where they scattered or buried their ashes. Perhaps the rise in the popularity of cremation suggests that the notion of bodily resurrection falls into the discarded theology pile, or that we don’t have any problem believing in a God who can reconstitute bodies from disintegrated atoms and nothingness. Personally, I’d much rather upgrade to a ‘heavenly body’ than stay put in my current model, especially if I live to enter senescence -incontinence, arthritis and the rest of decreptitude’s ensemble (as Bill Shakespeare memorably put it, ’second childishness and mere oblivion, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything’).

More significantly, do we, will we, wait for the umpire’s celestial whistle? In the cosmic scheme of things a final reckoning seems called for. The mass killings, enslavements, rapine, petty tyrannies, horrors of war, cruelties of neglect and abuse - the random acts of unkindness - all seem, like Abel, to call out to God. Spilt blood bears witness to our fallen state.

Jesus said that we will face a judgment; judging by his descriptions it is one that will surprise many of us who feel we are safely encamped among ‘the righteous’. Like many people, I take great comfort from the ‘eternal happiness of the righteous’ (Revelation’s chapters 5,7, 21 and 22 being among the most aspired to, hopeful and inspired writings of any religion).

Like many people, I also find great discomfort in the 19th century take on biblical writings that follows; the anticipation of ‘the endless punishment of the wicked.’ Ultimately, that does not sound like God. Ultimately, torture, pain and revenge don’t sound like Jesus. Ultimately, endless punishment doesn’t come from the same place as love, joy and peace.

It does not sound like it is God’s call; yet it is a call made clear and recorded in various scriptural passages. It comes back full circle to the first doctrine; that scripture is inspired by God and ‘constitutes the Divine rule of Christian faith and practice’. Do you believe that, knowing the passages we struggle with? The Scriptures record that God started this whole business going and state that God is said to be ready to pack it all in; in God’s good time.

If God exists, and I believe God does, then the brutalities of human existence happen because God permits them to ensure our free will, or because God is powerless to prevent them. A powerless God cannot, by definition, be God. A God who surrenders power or stays His hand points to grace. But blood, the stuff of life, cries out to the maker of life for justice.

Christianity, as with Judaism, believes that it duly follows that the desecration of life by natural disasters (we used to call them acts of God) that indiscriminately strike ‘the just and the unjust alike’ occurs because the world is ‘fallen’. All creation groans, the Apostle Paul wrote, waiting for deliverance.

Without dragging this article into the mires of eschatological second-guessing or the mazes of prophecy and parable, it is enough to accept that we don’t know. We speculate, we ponder, we pray and hope for grace and forgiveness because of Christ’s life, death and renewed life through his body, the Church.

God’s will is not our will. Judgment, if it comes, will come from God.

In this final doctrinal jaunt let’s consider this ambiguous entity we call The Salvation Army (complete with its self-important capital T in the definite article, but nowadays missing much of the zealous self-belief and drive that led to its inception).

What does it profit a non-profit to save the world? Bear with me here, because this deliberation has direct relevance to our 11th doctrine and its notions of the righteous and the wicked.

Option A: Do we finally see our way clear to owning our part in the broader church and retreat fully into numerical insignificance (at least in the West)? Do we go about shunning ‘evil companions’?

A few years back the Australia Southern Territory’s corps programme department conducted research of its members (soldiers) to discover that the vast majority of those surveyed live in a Salvationist enclave. They don’t evangelise, because it’s icky, uncomfortable and feels forced. That’s largely because they don’t genuinely know and engage with anyone who is not like them already. They live, breathe and sometimes work in a Salvation Army frame of mind that doesn’t include others.

Option B: Do we continue with our holistic mission as a paramilitary Christian body, caring for body and soul (mind you, not always catering for the ‘mind’) and treating ‘the least of these, my brothers and sisters’ as if they were Christ himself?

This ‘Option B’ is my obvious preference and prayer; yet it flies in the face of the reality (in my home country of Australia at any rate) that those who statistically comprise The Salvation Army (soldiers, adherent members, junior soldiers) still have a marked chasm between their everyday lives and the social welfare conducted by mostly secular people (good, caring people) in their name.

Finally, the dreaded but not by any means inevitable Option C:  do we see - as has been warned against by several credible Salvation Army prophets in Australia - the Army rapidly shuffling off its older generations (as comrades are promoted to glory and younger, potential Salvationists vote with their feet), sloughing off its holiness skin and emerging as a social welfare agency with quaint Christian antecedents?

Despite the rear guard raging against the dying of an earlier generation’s light (as has been seen in a Salvation Army magazine’s letters to the editor pages in recent years in the Australia Southern Territory, manifesting a willingness to kick the social workers who slog away on a shoddy yet superannuated and salary-packaged wage for ‘not being Salvationists’), it is the service of our rapidly turning-over workforce (Salvation Army social workers have an annual 20% attrition rate) that actively presents Christ’s compassion to ‘the least of these’.

Like that elusive, tick-marked Greek goddess, social program staff members out in the territory ‘just do it’; helping others without judging or condemning them. It is a witness to Christians, delivered by people who are often not Christians, yet act in accordance with the light they have been given. Ain’t no bushels over their lamps, thank God.

The 11th doctrine has been used by some, and is in danger of still being used by all of us, as a spiritual ‘get-out-of-hell’ card. That approach ignores the central message of the gospel: God wants us to be rescued, and wants us to rescue others. If we adhere to the mindset of this doctrine concerning the secular, unchurched staff doing God’s work as per Christ’s instructions - work for which we happily accept the applause - then we put ourselves into the seat of judgment and ultimately see both our staff and the folks they help as hell-bound, unlike saintly lil’ us.

What incredible, colossal hubris. ‘Judge not so you are not judged.’

We need to wrestle with that mindset; a worldview that puts people in different camps. We need to live the ‘Sheep and Goats’ message of Christ. If we declare that we are righteous and others are wicked, if we value our rep or our sovereignty at the risk of neglecting those around us in despair and crises, then we are no different from the Levite and the Priest who left the aggravated assault victim to wait in pain and brokenness, suffering until he received the unwanted ministrations of a despised foreigner who wasn’t in the club, let alone the approved theological mix.

Grace came to town in the person of Jesus. Grace would suggest we don’t label ourselves or our fellow creatures. Grace calls us to bind wounds, apply unguents and dispense medicines. Come to think of it, that Pythonesque waiter’s philosophy of service ain’t that far removed from Christ’s golden rule.

The challenge for all who call themselves Christians, and all who embrace the ethos of The Salvation Army, comes in the thinking behind our doing.

If we pause for honest reflection the answers to these re-cast ‘action points’ that follow our doctrines (below) will be at best ’sometimes’, at worst ‘never’.

Always, throughout all time and beyond, we are covered by a preserving grace that calls us to chase these dreams in the name of a Father who calls us on, the example and passion of a Son who walked the walk, and the power and peace of a supernatural Spirit who calls out to us from the mountains tops, the streets, the beaches and deserts of our lives.

A Salvationist says they will: be responsive to the Holy Spirit’s work and obedient to His leading…growing in grace through worship, prayer, service and the reading of the Bible; make the values of the kingdom of God and not the values of the world the standard for my life; uphold Christian integrity in every area of my life, allowing nothing in thought, word or deed that is unworthy, unclean, untrue, profane, dishonest or immoral; maintain Christian ideals in all my relationships with others: my family and neighbours, my colleagues and fellow Salvationists, those to whom and for whom I am responsible, and the wider community; uphold the sanctity of marriage and of family life; be a faithful steward of my time and gifts, my money and possessions, my body, my mind and my spirit, knowing that I am accountable to God; abstain from alcoholic drink, tobacco, the non-medical use of addictive drugs. gambling, pornography, the occult, and all else that could enslave the body or spirit; be faithful to the purposes for which God raised up The Salvation Army, sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, endeavouring to win others to Him, and in His name caring for the needy and the disadvantaged; be actively involved, as l am able, in the life, work, worship and witness of the corps, giving as large a proportion of my income as possible to support its ministries and the worldwide work of the Army; be true to the principles and practices of The Salvation Army, loyal to its leaders, and show the spirit of Salvationism whether in times of popularity or persecution.
So, just quietly, between you and me, how do you rate your life measured against these aspirations? In all honesty, in terms of fulfilling all these expectations, I don’t do so good.
SuperChristian is a role that I will never measure up to. I need God’s grace and strength to get closer to who God actually wants me to be.

Writer: Barry Gittins is a Melbourne-based writer, lifelong Salvationist, husband (to Trudy) and father(to Emily and Benjamin) who seeks God in everyday encounters. A frustrated poet and playwright, he has worked for the Salvos’ Australia Southern Territory in various roles since 1991: as a journalist (for Warcry, The Young Soldier/Kidzone, The Musician),technical writer and CD-ROM author in corps program (mission development), senior review editor (Warcry) and editor (On Fire). He currently works as a social program and policy consultant (writer/researcher) for the social program department.

1 Comment to I was a teenage fundamentalist - #11

1. Hey Barrie

   Thanks for such an interesting take on the doctrines. Great timing when you see the new Handbook coming out.

   Your writing is thought provoking and appreciated.

   Peter B
Peter B on May 26th, 2010

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