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LECTURE III - REFLECTIONS ON THE ROLE OF THE CHURCH

 

Let me start by recapitulating a little bit the main drift of what I have said yesterday. I tried to present the fact that the world situa­tion as we experience it today as compared with that of the period immediately after World War II is a much more cluttered, much more pluralistic world in its ideologi­cal, political, and perhaps even economic contours.

One of the things that we deal with is to chart our way from less of the bipolar world that emerged out of WW II into a much more tripolar world in which there are all sorts of other centres of power both political and ideological that are presenting themselves to the world.

I then turned around, however, to our Asian scene. It seems that, partly, as a result of the Vietnam War and the sifting strategy (or phase) of Capitalist power at this time of our history, the ideological and political scene in Asia seems to have been brought to the point where in reality there seems to be only two options that confront us today. On the one hand, the option presented by the ideology of military technocracy, and on the other, various models of socialist ideals.

Now, when I said that these are the two options left, I am not saying that we cannot construct other options. Neither am I selling one instead of necessarily the other. I am simply saying that it seems to me that the historical forces that have governed Asian realities and politics over the last several years seem to have eliminated any real options for the future. Real in the sense that they have really any viability for any long-term projection. There are only two options left: a model of socialist construction based on socialism, and military technocracy.

These are not basically conservative in

 

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character. As a matter of fact, both are futuristic. I have said that both pretend to be the real future of Asia. The rise of socialist powers in Asia as China and emergent socialist Indochina territories (Vietnam, Kampuchea and Laos) are in themselves powerful. These are faced with this new phenomenon in the development of capitalist influence in the area which I simply call military technocracy. To a cer­tain extent, there is a sense in which the initial phase of military technocracy has given military technocrats some confidence that they are presenting a viable option. As a matter of fact, there is a sense of strength in them. For those who do not live inside the socialist block countries in Asia, we may have to atune ourselves to the fact that military technocracy, at least for the foreseeable future, may be the political context within which we have to operate.

Military technocrats have attained some confidence – partly as a result of some innovations presented and partly because of the decadence of liberal democracy. I said that the sheer weight of emergent military technocracy has wiped out the realistic possibilities of liberal democracy. It is not a viable option anymore. While I have some sympathy for some people in this country, that seem to harp on the return of the old liberal democracy, I don't think there is any future for them. This is my assessment at this particular point.

Mr Lee Kuan Yew of Singapore has just gone through an election in which the PAP (Peoples Action Party) won all the seats. I believe that the elections were rigged but at the same time, I must admit that he must have been doing something good. Other­wise, there should have been one or two areas, that would vote against him. There is a sense of achievement for some of countries in the ASEAN configuration. There seems to be a new sense of confidence among the countries belonging to this grouping because at the height of the Vietnam War these coun­tries were so nervous that the war will spill over to their own territories and create all kinds of dissentions.

As a matter of fact, during the last 4 or 5 years since the Vietnam War, there have been greater degree of stability on the part of the military technocratic regimes.

This afternoon, I shift to a more pedantic, less exciting world of the church. I am not entirely sure how this is to fit with all that I have said earlier I am not sure, either, how things I am going to say at this time will fit with what Dr. Levi Oracion will say in his theological reflections. I do not want to preempt what he might say. Anyway, what I have to say will not be in the realm of theological reflections because it will not be a theology of political involvement or dis – involvement, or a theology of liberation or solidarity. I am really going to speak about the Church as an institutional reality on Asia.

We all know that the Church as a human, empirical institution came into being as a part of the colonial incursion of the western world into Asia. A writing that has recently come to us among ecumenical circles is one on religions in China. In this particular book. there is a section on present attitude towards the Christian enterprise. The thesis of the section being referred to centers on the fact that in China, religions (and this includes Christianity) has served as an opiate. China today stands as a paradigm of a society, which has completely rejected the Christian mission. Whether we agree with this judg­ment or not, the important thing is that in our region, there has been this effort to obtain liberation from oppressive forces or powers coming from the outside. China reflects the emergency of a history of the people asserting their aspiration and making themselves subjects of history.

 

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We must admit as Christians bearing the name of Christ, that the Church has been part of that colonial incursion by western powers in Asia shores.

Let me give an example. The Dutch Reform­ed Church, which developed in Indonesia, originated initially as simply the church of the North Borneo Company. Dutch corpora­tion executives of the DNBC, the main chartered trade agency of Holland and Batavia, needed Christian ministry among the traders and so it became important for the Dutch Reformed Church to begin sending ministers in order that there would be a church of the multi-national executives. This was the origin of the church in Indo­nesia. And, the natives began to be adherents at the faith. But, for long, it was nothing but a church for the traders and colonizers. It was their church with some Indonesian members in it.

But there is a later development. As the Indonesian members increased in number, it became apparent that the expansion and indigenization of Christianity in Indonesia, might as a matter of fact, be helpful in the forwarding of the cause and purpose of DNBC itself. (Incidentally, I have read this in my doctoral dissertation.) DNBC people themselves later found out that it would be good to give or allocate in their budget what is know as "disciple" money. Part of the scheme was to pay money to anyone who is able to convert Indonesians to Christianity. Here, world business gave directly for evangelism. Local Christians, they believe, would increase the chances of the propagation of their business interest.

Some of you may be familiar with the writings of the old Dutch theologian, Hen – Jrick Kraemer, in which he was saying that it was time for the Indonesian church to stop being the company church and begin really living as the Church of Jesus Christ in Indonesia.

Some of us also know what happened in the history of the Church in the Philippines. We know that orders were given the con­quistadors by the crown of Spain not only to colonize but also to Christianize the Philippines. This is the reason why today the Philippines is universally known as the only so-called Christian country in Asia and this was a direct result of the colonial policy of Spain. In various Asian countries, this relationship between colonial policy and the expansion of the Church emerges all the time.

But, there is also the realistic situation of distinction between colonial and missionary or goals or policies. Holland was mainly colonialists, and didn't have Spain's idea of Philippine Christendom. Spanish Catholic­ism was very medieval at that time.

Then came to the Protestant missions during the 17th to the 19th centuries. Protestant churches during this period began to or­ganize all kinds of missionary organizations. So that when the Chinese began to accuse missions in China as operating under western imperialism, they had very, very specific evidence for it. It is a historical fact, for example, that in the unequal treaties written between imperial powers and China, that the translators as well as the secretaries were missionaries. All of the rapourteurs of the meeting, those who wrote the reports, were missionaries. Missionaries, too, became in­volved in the opium trade. There was this very famous missionary, Carl Gutzlav from the German mission society who arrived in Canton one day and on one side of the ship he was distributing tracts, while on the other he was unloading opium. This is a literal historical fact! You read the history books and you will discover even the name of the ship used for this kind of operation.

But, you see, from Mr. Gutzlav's standpoint there was no theological or any other problem in this kind of operation at all.

 

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The prevailing theology of mission at that time, even church leaders, endorsed this. Namely, that the expanding power of the western world technologically, politically and economically was some kind of "preparatio evangelico" — a preparation of the Gospel. That is, somehow, in His providence — God was using the expansion of the west in a way by which the Gospel may be brought into all parts of the world.

Mr. Gutzlav later, during the defeat of China in the so-called Opium War, brought an exaltative letter to his mission body in Germany. You will find an account of this is any good library. He exalted over the fact that China lost the Opium War not so much because of British military power but be­cause of God's providence, so that China may be open to the Christian Gospel. This account is written in Gutzlav's missionary letters.

This kind of attitude is also found among the American boards of missions even in 1901. Meeting about their China mission policy around this time, they used the theology that China, being a closed country (ethnocentric), was being opened to the Gospel because of western power. So that there were no qualms about the fact that the missionaries were serving in the making of treaties, etc.

I am saying all these because of the fact that we who carry the name "Christian" in this part of the world carry some kind of stigma, which I don't think we can theologize away.

Let me return to the idea of the kicking out of missionaries (Americans largely) from China. Americans for a time thought that it was stupid for the Chinese to drive out missionaries, but this is so because American Perception of China has been one of a perception via the missionaries. From the turn of the 19th Century to the middle of the 20th, the largest deployment of missionary personnel was in China. The largest amount of money, were put into the China mission.

After Word War II, around the early '50s, some of us remember that at that time churches, like those in the Philippines, had to absorb some of the missionaries who had to leave China. I was beginning my seminary career at that time and we had one or two for teacher at the seminary belong­ing to the China Inland Mission. The Chinese kicked them out and they were reassigned somewhere in Asia, a whole host of them. A great number have been assigned to US mainland and this, again, provided some of the ingredients of what you may call anti-Chinese feeling among the American popula­tion fomented by many of these missionar­ies. So many things at that time were being said, like, the Chinese are an atheistic, God­less society, because she kicked us all out.

But, if one will be objective about the history of the church in China, the kicking out is completely understandable. There are three stages in the evolution of the missionary enterprise in China. First, is the Catholic Jesuit stage. This period was dominated what is well known, not only in missionary circles, but also in the cultural realm. M. Ricci was one of the first persons to translate texts of Chinese literature into western language. He is very much like William Carey in Serampore, who became well known in India for becoming a transla­tor of Sanskrit. Indians regarded him as famous not merely because of missionary activities but because of his literary contri­butions. M. Ricci had the same history in relation to China. He translated the scholarly works of Chinese literature into English and other western languages for the understand­ing of the world. But, he was able to do this because of the Jesuit conception of what missions is all about. This was exactly a major part of the strategy of the Jesuit missionary order.

 

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Jesuits believe that in order to be able to Convert China one must be able to convert its literate scholars who hovered around the emperor. The Jesuit conception or vision of mission in the 16th Century was almost entirely Constantinian. Look for a Chinese Constantine and you will be able to Chris­tianize China. Europe was converted to Christianity this way, as you know. M. Ricci tried desperately to look for a Chinese Constantine but no one developed this way.

Now, not only do Christians have a stigma in Asia but that the superstructure of the church in our part of the world I am un­happy to classify as gothic. I say that the im­pression the church in our part of the world is gothic because the church is seen as heavy set, very strong base, architecture design being grandiose and pointing to heaven and to God. Gothic also means that it is medieval Christianity, to be certain. The base may be the city of man but at the top we always say that there we have the purpose of God. This is our image in Asia.

To my mind, what is needed is for us some­how to re-create some kind of an image of the historical reality of the Christian com­munity and to draw out a few tasks from that image.

Partly because I drive a car, I have struck upon an idea of what the Christian com­munity might be in the very simple and common service station. This is a very American terminology and shows even part of my American English background, but the service station is a general name for buy­ing gasolines, etc. in the U.S. The service station provides for me a kind of realistic image, not grandiose, of what the church may be as a historical entity.

I wish the Church would be like a simple service station. Now, look at it from the background of that spiritual community – Gothic in both structure and theology, dualistic in terms of its approach to reality and the historical world, a bit of colonial background, heavy, as a matter of fact in that insolated perhaps and even irrelevant – in the political struggles as they come at this time. If we can only transform our image of the Church, and here 1 include the Student Christian Movements, into what I call as the service station, it must first of all exist to provide for those outside its own life. The church should, in a sense, be outward rather than inward — oriented. Service station people, as you probably know, are not too interested about how pure they are; they are judged entirely for the service they offer.

You will notice that service stations do not have walls. They are most obvious; they have the widest entrances. They go to the smallest barrios (unit of community in the Philippines). A motorist can drive into the station almost immediately. Nobody checks you. Service stations are located in the most traveled highways and by-ways rather than in isolated places. You don't see them in the interior parts; they are almost always right by the highways; right at the inter­sections. They are always at the functional rather than the detours of human traffic.

Service stations are for re-fuelling. I should also add that they are an important place for common gossips among travelers. If you want to listen to some real gossips, go to a service station for there you find the talk of common people. There is also something, which for me is rather important among service stations — people there know where they are going — they know the way to this place and that. In a service station, one also does not stay. Many people go to the service station to ask for direction. Service stations know the direction in the area where they are located. The ideal service station attendant for me is not only one who puts

 

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gasoline in my tank but one who is able to sow me the streets, the corners, the inside corridors, the houses. They know the place – day and night!

Service station attendants know the terrain and the inhabitants of the area. You can go in a service station and ask for the house of so and so, and he will tell you where that house is. They can give you information day or night.

Finally, I should say to use the commercials of one of the gas companies, the service station “puts a tiger in your tank”. The service station puts power into your tank; power to move you further.

I would say that, in my view, a basic and realistic approach to the ministry of the church is that of a service station. I say this realizing fully well that I do not expect the church to be on the vanguard of the work for Liberation. I don't think it is realistic to expect the church to be more than what it presently is. But, at least, we can expect some kind of transformation in which it becomes serviceable to certain things. Cer­tain things that are happening, and this it can do without a too radical conversion of its total life.

Now, when I say that I like the image of a service station, I say so because it is open. Here, I am implying that the church as well must be open to all peoples. The church, to me, is imprisoned not only by its walls but by its social status. The church must be open to all — it must be the people's church. This is important! And, when I say that the service station is a stopping point for people to know where they are going, the church to me, must likewise be the same. The church must present to the people visions — of what exactly they will do. This could be given all sorts of geographical, sociological or Political content.

Finally, the church is supposed to give power, or share some of its power, hopefully, to those who have run out of power.

The church, hopefully, can become an empowering station, an agent for those who are powerless in this world. When I talk of the church, I am taking it as an inter­pretative Christian community, which I hope will be said of SCM’s as well. SCM’s too are not expected to be at the vanguard of the movement for Liberation – but these too could be empowering, servicing stations.

SCM’s may decide to which ones they would like to give service, but basically the idea is for them to have servicing role in society. If the church (and SCM’s) becomes this type of institution or movement, a service station institution, I would think of the following services, apart from empowering, that it might do.

First, is to begin to provide for those who come to its services. By the way, it is not accidental that the worship in a Christian community is called "service". It is supposed to be that - a service. But, in my view, this service could in fact be something like a spirit of critical consciousness which the church could provide for those who are within its fold. I mean, a critical conscious­ness of what is happening in the world. By critical, by the way, I do not mean -negative - or simply as a form of criticism. By this is meant that the church helps in making those within its fold a bit more aware of the forces that control them in this world - and how they may be liberated from those forces. This is what I mean by critical consciousness. A better awareness of their location in society - whether it is knowledge of the realities of their oppress­ion on the one hand or the possibility of their liberation on the other. The church can and should be able to provide that!

Second, I feel that alongside providing a critical consciousness, the Church must also give a scientific analysis of the world. I do not mean that we teach a course in science here. What I mean is skills of analysis by which one can root out precisely the sources of oppression and the possibility for libera­tion I was talking about earlier. I don't think

 

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that the church's work in the world is done by merely giving spiritual advices. There must be some impartation of what I shall all as the scientific spirit. A scientific analysis, not only of the world of nature, but also with the world of men/women in society.

Finally, although there are other points that could be added, I think the Christian community must be a garden of utopias, a seedbed of utopias, of visions. I am saying this because, following my assertion that we are living in a world of cluttered ideologies, here has also been a narrowing also of ideological options. I have to say that in a sense am not talking of Utopias in the sense simply of dreaming up unworkable theories — but utopias as lubricants into political theories. I happen to believe that if there are 10 more Utopias I think political theories will stop.

Utopians have always pushed realists farther. This is why I feel that the church could encourage the form of utopianism particularly n the world, which is so governed by technocratic mentality, in which what is possible is what, is in technocratic rationality. As I have said earlier, one of the things, which fascinate me about our President is that he projects himself as a Utopian visionary. I think the Christian communities must out-dream the President and other military technocrats. Some of you may perhaps know the distinction between ideology and Utopia as Karl Mannheim has it in his "The Ideology of Utopia". Mannheim goes further than Marx because he proposes the fact that ideologies are basically conservative — because they are rooted in the realities of the present.

Whereas, Utopias are revolutionary because they are not logical — they are not rooted in the present. I am not following Mann­heim's basic thinking but simply saying that in a world which has become arid of visions because of technocracy, technological logic, to a certain degree does not allow Utopias. I think a few Utopias around will help a little bit — not that they can be exchanged for realities — but because, notice this final point, Utopias are lubricants to real political action.

I close here.