"Do you dare preach about the corruption of power in the Christian Church... teaching its past...revealing the sins of the present? In fact, do you preach about the too familiar problem of the desire for power within the local churches? Remember, you can't fix a problem until acknowledge there is one. Think about it."
Hmmm. She poses a good question. One that merits the "think about it" challenge.
As I did just that, a thought came to me that may not be unique, but it was certainly a new awareness for me. I suddenly saw the irony in "Christ the King Sunday" and "Thanksgiving Sunday" falling on the same week. The Pilgrims, who are credited with the first "Thanksgiving feasts", fled to this land to escape the "state religion" of England, and find a place where they were free to express their faith as they wished. The Pilgrims were Congregationalists, my "ancestors" (speaking of my church family, that is). My biological ancestors, however, did much the same thing when they immigrated by masses from Cardiganshire, Wales, to communities in Southern Ohio approximately 200 years later.
Dorothy Okray is right when she speaks of the injustices meted out by early Christianity, as evidenced in the records of history. Once it received the "sanction" of the Roman Empire, the power behind that support was often misused, as power over another tends to be. It is why I am uneasy when the United States government becomes involved at all in matters of the Church. It is all-too-easy for the power behind that support to be abused and misused.
It's why I believe that Jesus himself would have not only encouraged, but insisted, on a separation of church and state.
Jesus said, "Give to the emperor the things that are the emperor's, and to God the things that are God's." (Mark 12:17)
Very snappy headline - totally pulled me in!
ReplyDeleteAnd I always appreciate a resource or voice I might otherwise have missed. AND I think your point about corruption in the Church beginning as soon as it was in Rome's pocket. That is very valid, a stern warning for all of us about the very real dangers of becoming jaded about Bishops on Capital Hill and religious special interest groups. I think I would have openned with that - here is where the church went wrong a thousand years ago, etc.I also like how you pulled that across the sea to the US.