Liberalism: What does it mean for the Church?

by Rick Brown

Delivered at the Annual General Meeting of the Anglican Church League, Sydney, July 1996

As part of my ongoing post-graduate studies in political science, I watch re-runs of that BBC documentary, Yes Prime Minister.

As it happens I recently saw an episode with which no doubt you are all familiar, 'The Bishop's Gambit' in which Sir Humphrey explains to the master and bursar of his alma mater that it is too late to influence the appointment to the Diocese of Bury St. Edmunds where the Church wants a candidate to maintain the balance between those who believe in God and those who do not.

You might recall the Appointments Secretary's meeting with Jim Hacker: the preferred candidate was a Modernist--'A theological term, Prime Minister. It seems that he accepts that some events described in the Bible are not literally true--he sees them as metaphors, legends or myths. He is interested in the spiritual and philosophical truth behind the stories'. He also 'had an eminently suitable wife', which did not mean that she was 'devout and full of good works', but rather that she was the the daughter of the Earl of Dorchester.

The cagey Prime Minister asked Sir Humphrey what was a Modernist and was told:

SH: 'In the Church of England the word Modernist is code for non-believer.'
JH: 'An atheist?'
SH 'Oh no, Prime Minister. An atheist clergyman couldn't continue to draw his stipend. So when they stop believing in God they call themselves modernists.'
JH: 'How can the Church of England recommend an atheist as Bishop of Bury St. Edmunds?'
SH: 'Very easily. The Church of England is primarily a social organisation, not a religious one.'

There were a few more exchanges and then Sir Humphrey said: 'The Church is trying to be more relevant'. Jim Hacker asked 'To God?' and Sir Humphrey replied: 'Of course not , Prime Minister. I meant relevant in sociological terms.'
A bit more banter was followed by this exchange:

SH: 'You see, the church is run by theologians.'
JH: 'What does that mean?'
SH: 'Well, theology's a device for helping agnostics stay within the church.'

Whenever I watch that episode I am reminded of a former Bishop of London, Dr. Graham Leonard, who, in 1987, observed that 'The growing division in Christianity is between the so-called theological 'liberals' who believe both scripture and tradition have lost their authority and who wish to re-shape Christianity in accordance with modern ideas, and the so-called 'conservatives' who maintain the unique authority of Scripture. That division applies in all denominations'.

Dr. Leonard's comment was made at the height of the debate over the ordination of women to the priesthood, and, at a time when the traditional dividing lines within the Anglican churches were being re-defined. That theological liberalism has so fundamentally affected dynamics within not only our Communion but all the major denominations is not really surprising. Arguably it is symbolic of philosophic liberalism's reaching its zenith some 2 centuries after its formal challenge to the prevailing political order, including the authority of the Church.

Pierre Manent, the Director of Studies at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, wrote, in An Intellectual History of Liberalism (Princeton University Press, 1994), that -

'As we saw with Hobbes, this democratise device was established at the origins of the liberal or modern project. In order to escape decisively from the power of the singular religious institution of the Church, one had to renounce thinking about human life in terms of its good or its end, which would always be vulnerable to the Church's 'trump'' (p.114). Manent continues, 'The motivating force of modern history thus appears to be two-fold: the natural desire to escape from the political power of revealed religion; the no less natural desire to escape the mechanism man conceived to satisfy the first failure' (p.116).

It is not surprising that, Christianity having been marginalised as a social and ethical force, the churches find themselves divided as the scepticism, if not opposition, to revelation which now permeates our society finds expression within our ranks.

There is a temptation to say that Dr. Leonard's assessment was jaundiced since the ordination of women is not a comprehensive test of orthodoxy. After all, look at the divergence within evangelical ranks. Indeed some would say that little has changed. The Anglican Church has been at least three churches - evangelical, catholic and middle-- for a long time.

If one assumes that the traditional dynamics prevail, theological diversity, which is at least as well reflected in Melbourne as in any other diocese, would suggest significant proportions of evangelicals and catholics, if not middle church people as well. In fact my picture of Melbourne is of a church in which liberals are the most influential, the evangelicals are numerically significant, and the catholics are a small group who frequently find themselves in a bind. There are also pragmatists, who probably see themselves as middle, but they do not want to offend the liberals.

With the bishops assembling at Lambeth next year, might I return to England for a moment to point to events, the consequences of which might weigh on the minds of some of them. At the beginning of the year the Archbishop of Canterbury suggested that while Prince Charles, who has admitted to adultery, could not marry Mrs. Camilla Parker Bowles, a divorcee, in the Church of England he was 'comfortable' with the blessing of a marriage in the Church of Scotland. In the furore that followed it was probably inevitable that the fact that 2 of the Archbishop's 4 children are divorced and that one has re-married was mentioned.

A couple of weeks later more controversy followed. Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and the primates of Scotland, Canada and America, endorsed a campaign to ordain homosexual priests (The Herald Sun , 7th February, 1996). More recently a former Archbishop of Canterbury, Lord Runcie, has said he knowingly ordained practicing homosexuals. It seems he adopted the expedient of not asking questions to which he did not want to hear the answers (The Herald Sun , 17th May, 1996).

In the meantime there had been a vote on amending the divorce law. William Rees-Mogg, who supported extending the waiting period to 18 months where one partner objected to the divorce, or where children are involved, wrote:

'We were outvoted by the usual moral majority in the House of Lords, a coalition of permissives and placepersons... It included, inevitably, Lord Habgood, the recently retired Archbishop of York, who can be relied on to vote for the progressive ticket' (London Times , 18th March, 1996).

Crossing the Atlantic, the Episcopal Church has ruled that Bishop Righter did not break any church law when he ordained a practicing homosexual as a deacon. By a majority of 7 to 1, a Court for the Trial ruled that there is

'no core doctrine prohibiting the ordination of a non-celibate, homosexual person living in a faithful and committed sexual relationship with a person of the same sex.' The Court did not find 'sufficient clarity in the church's teaching at the present time concerning the morality of same sex relationships' to uphold the charge, laid by 10 bishops, of 'holding and teaching...doctrine contrary to that held by this church' (Anglican News , June, 1996, p.6).

Homosexuality and divorce have been the cause of controversy in Melbourne also in recent months. You may know of Dr. Muriel Porter, who presumably would not object to being described as a liberal, even though last month she spoke at a symposium on homosexuality with her vicar and a Uniting Church minister, which was described as being for the middle ground. Dr. Porter supported Archbishop Tutu's call to ordain practicing homosexuals.

She wrote in Melbourne's Herald-Sun that

'the church's official attitude is that any sex outside marriage is wrong...That increasingly unrealistic rule, however, is used to condemn homosexuality. It gives no room whatsoever even for long-term faithful partnerships.' She said if the Church accepted homosexual partnerships it 'would take away their last vestige of control over (sexual activity), and with it, their tendency to be self-righteous' (Herald Sun , 27th February, 1996).

Dr. Porter took up the cudgels a few months later on another issue. In 1989 Melbourne published a pastoral handbook which contains a liturgy for a release from marriage vows. The bishops at their conference this year questioned the appropriateness of the words 'In the name of God I solemnly release you from your former vows.'

Bishop Silk said

'it was not for the church to release a person from a vow they had made to another person' (The Age , 6th May, 1996).

In an article in The Age Dr. Porter wrote

'It is yet another sign that church leaders find it hard to face the reality of the vast changes that have affected family life in recent decades....In some quarters, at least, the church finds it hard to abandon its self-appointed role of 'moral policeman', insisting that its catchcry of 'no sex outside marriage' is the inviolable command of God for all people, in all ages' (The Age , 7th May, 1996).

At about the same time the Uniting Church released a Task Group's Interim Report on Sexuality which contends that

'(m)any Christians now accept that Scripture contains what we would identify as core teachings and peripheral or derivative teachings, eternal truths and teachings applicable only to the time and place of writing...What is clear is that the role of Scripture..requires urgent clarification. We need to formulate how the Bible can legitimately be used in ways that avoid two unacceptable extremes: an approach that distorts the text to make it say what we want it to say today, and a tyranny that usurps our responsibility for living in faithful response to the gospel in our time and place' (pp. 16-17).

Some of the statements which reflect the Task Force's grappling with this issue are:

Dr. Porter put the issue another way:

'The Church has changed its mind often about divorce, re-marriage and contraception...If the Church can change its mind on these issues it can change its mind on others.'

Thus is raised the question of whether there are any issues on which the Church cannot change its mind.

Writing in The Age , a Melbourne minister, Dr. David Powys', response to this question was that if the Church is to remain true to its calling to be 'in' the world and not 'of' the world, we must

'refuse to abandon convictions that flow from (God's) revelation: the goodness of creation; the dignity of every human being; the peril facing humanity on account of human wilfulness; the reality of sin, suffering and death; the primacy of justice and the divine obligation under which humanity stands; Christ's redeeming death, offer of forgiveness and invitation into his eternal kingdom; the gift of the Holy Spirit and the prospect of Christ's future coming to restore this broken and divided world.' (The Age , 6th June, 1996).

As both Dr. Leonard and Sir Humphrey suggest, the divide between liberals and orthodox is so wide that both cannot possibly be right. How then are we to judge the merits of these incompatible positions? Are we limited to theological argument, which appears to be ineffective in converting one view to the other, or are there other measures we can use as a guide? How does one measure relevance on which the liberal position puts great store? Are the numbers of people in the pews on Sunday a criterion?

These questions are not new. In his provocative thesis, published 13 years ago, Os Guinness made this observation:

'The third area where liberalism is destructive is where it is inherently weak in attracting outsiders . ...Confront liberals with such questions and their discomfiture is plain....The item is no longer on the agenda..

And what does the record show? It should be embarrassingly clear to them that of those intellectuals and artists who have been converted in the last 2 centuries.... the overwhelming majority have been attracted to traditional and more conservative churches...Why they took the road to religion will always remain a mystery, but they had undeniably keen minds and a certain intestinal fortitude. They took their faith neat and couldn't stomach the tepid and diluted offerings of liberalism' (The Gravedigger File (Hodder and Stoughton, 1983), pp. 220-21).

So far as we are concerned, it is difficult to draw conclusions. The statistics collated in Church Scene last year indicate that South Australia, Tasmania and regional Victoria have a significantly higher level of church attendance than Western Australia, the Northern Territory and Queensland.

The percentage of nominal Anglicans attending church in Sydney and Melbourne seems comparable, but attendance in Sydney is substantially higher if measured as a proportion of the total population. On the other hand confirmations in Sydney double Melbourne's and, as Church Scene pointed out, the statistic which stands out is Sydney's age profile compared with the other dioceses. If nothing else, it would appear that, in Sydney, theological orthodoxy, at the very least, does not inhibit church growth.

Looking at other denominations may provide a less sensitive approach. Not only are Baptist and Pentecostal (not to mention Morman) congregations, the low bases of which are acknowledged, younger, but the memberships of the major denominations have fallen while, in the words of the director of the Christian Research Centre, Phillip Hughes,

'what we have seen is a growth in the Pentecostal, Baptist and more conservative churches, which are concerned with private morality and want stricter laws on issues like homosexuality' (The Sunday Herald Sun , 24th September, 1995).

These developments are either symptoms or reflections of the causes of new pressures we must confront. These pressures, in turn, are generating different internal dynamics to which we need to respond. Rather than remind you of the vexed question as to whether the Anglican Church of Australia is a single voluntary association or a federation of associations or speculate about the potential implications of the Scandrett decision, may I recall the latest General Synod in which much time was spent debating proposals of the Bishop of Ballarat.

During the session, the acceptance of Mrs. Gabbott's proposal that in one of the marriage services the woman promise to love, honour and cherish her husband was described as a win for the Sydney Diocese, or, to quote Dr. Porter, 'hardline, fundamentalist, Sydney evangelists' (The Herald Sun , 7th July, 1996). The fact that Bishop Silk supported the proposition, just as he supported the removal of a feminist prayer with dubious theology, went largely unnoticed.

This highlights one of the challenges. How do we maintain our integrity, pursuing the truth on issues such as lay presidency and the real presence, while remembering that there is a veritable chasm between those who believe in a revealed religion and those who support a sociological one?

The liberals were angry with Mrs. Gabbott's initiative. One said it was 'very unfortunate the church is giving out a message women still should be in some form of subordination to their husband'. The fact that couples are not compelled to use this form of service was irrelevant.

Some have concluded that some theological liberals, to the use the words of the late American historian Christopher Lasch, 'When confronted with resistance to their initiatives,... become petulant, self-righteous, intolerant' (The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy (W.W. Norton, 1995), p.28).

Whether or not this perception is fair, we do need to form views about whether we have a basis for negotiation with liberals, whether they have any desire to negotiate and whether, for them, negotiation is merely a tactical retreat. As for the pragmatists, since it is difficult to determine what they really believe, discussion is in interesting, but not negotiation.

In the Association for the Apostolic Ministry's January 1996 Newsletter, an American, David Mills, uses the process of choosing candidates for bishop to demonstrate how he thinks orthodox dioceses tend to become liberal. He contends that the orthodox tend to be 'moderated', but the liberals do not; that as a consequence the orthodox tend to select representatives who will please liberals in the hope of influencing them; of how the resolve of the orthodox is weakened because they do not want to offend liberals whom they come to like personally; and how they rationalise the outcome.

May I turn briefly to some potentially awkward questions.

It seems that there is a movement of 10 to 15 per cent between protestant denominations annually. Contemporary music and informal services are factors. I suspect, also, that theology and preaching cannot be ignored. However, Os Guinness observed that

'because of pluralisation modern believers have become conversion prone...(T)he turnaround of conversion was complete and usually lasting...(I)t was a once in a lifetime requirement. This, too, has changed. Faith's precariousness leaves it to being converted--and reconverted and reconverted. Or, as we have recently perfected in American Christian circles, 'Born again and again and again'...ad infinitum. (The Gravedigger File , pp. 105-106).

What are we going to do if it becomes apparent that dioceses committed to orthodoxy are effective and those in which liberalism prevails are not? What will be the response to an invitation to provide leadership to a congregation in another diocese if they say their alternative is to leave? Should we ignore effective congregations who believe it is poor stewardship of their resources to make significant contributions to diocesan coffers, because they feel they are subsidising ineffective activities and parishes which are unlikely to be sufficiently challenged to become more effective? The Anglican Church operates a franchise at both a diocesan and parish level. With movement now extending beyond parish borders to other denominations and other beliefs will the time come when the monopolies conferred by the franchise system need to be reviewed?

Another challenge could be theological education. A discussion in the Melbourne Diocesan Council recently about funds for the Trinity Theological School led one evangelical minister to contend the numbers suggest that Australia can sustain only 4 schools--2 evangelical and 2 liberal. If his judgment about the number is right, without commenting on the ethos, it may be necessary to consider not only the effects of any rationalisation, but whether and how the schools which survive can broaden their ethos without compromising their principles.

I have left until last a matter which may seem trivial to some.

Nobody, notwithstanding the rhetoric of some liberals, denies the need for us to be culturally relevant. I wonder how far we can go, and I am not speaking theologically, if we are not to devalue the uniqueness of our belief or not to fail to establish the relevance and unique attraction of Christianity. This question has arisen for me because of a series of advertisement promoting Australian Rules-- which is often described as Victoria's secular religion. In one, Archbishop Tutu says, 'I hear you guys worship Aussie Rules. Hey, what kind of religion is that?'. These advertisements subsequently have been used by McDonalds.

This advertisement appears at a time when a reader in sociology at Latrobe University Dr. John Carroll points to some secular venues having been sacralised, the most obvious example being sporting arenas. It may be that I am being too sensitive by far. However I recall Oz Guinness' observations about consumer religion:

'Christians might have learned from the youth market in the sixties, which is the immediate forerunner of the evangelical market in the seventies...Once these things were on the market, however, they could be sold by and bought by anyone. As a result, counter-cultural symbols lost their distinctiveness and became fashionable, then empty and open to manipulation.' (The Gravedigger File , p. 139).

Might I conclude by referring again to Dr. Carroll's address, delivered during the celebration of St. Peter's Eastern Hill 150th anniversary.

He said:

'The more insecure Christianity has become about God, faith, salvation and destiny the more it has displaced its attention onto secular, political issues and doctrines of 'social rights'. While the churches have provided charity that has often, no doubt, been more effectively humane than what is carried out as government welfare, their principal role remains the ministry of souls, not of bodies or minds' (The Crisis of Belief: Whereto the Church? , June 1996).

This observation presents a challenge to which I believe liberalism is incapable of a response. This conviction is not based solely on those oft-recited words, the bible tells me so, but also, to quote Dr. Powys, on the fact that

'History has repeatedly demonstrated that when the church becomes confused about its loyalties, the well-being of society is itself jeopardised. When the church has been willing to merely mirror public opinion or parrot the words of rulers and governments, it has lost its saltiness. When it has been prepared to say 'Thus says the Lord' without fear or favour, even when this is met with scorn and derision then it has best served wider society.'

For my part, I am bound to reject liberalism which may be a soft option, but which, I believe, will lead, deservedly, to the destruction of the Anglican Church, however long that may take. Pursuing truth is not a comfortable, or necessarily profitable, occupation.

However, to quote, Dr. Powys, while 'truth will not always bring comfort, comfort does not necessarily bring salvation.'

 

Rick Brown, 18th July 1996

Mr. Rick Brown is a former union official and is currently Secretary of the Council for the National Interest. He is a long-time member of the General Synod of the Anglican Church of Australia and is a member of the Melbourne Diocesan Council.

(Copyright Rick Brown 1996)

 

Anglican Church League, www.acl.asn.au