M.R.I. - Or Pre-M.R.I.?
Diocesan Press Service. June 6, 1966 [44-1]
Ralph S. Dean, Executive Officer, Anglican Communion
This is a question that the Executive Officer has frequently to ask as he roams round the world, and all those associated with him - and they are many - have increasingly to do so too. Undoubtedly there is a good deal of misunderstanding rife about the whole concept of "Mutual Responsibility and Interdependence in the Body of Christ" - that document with the cumbersome title which emerged at the time of the Anglican Congress, Toronto, 1963. This is plain from the questions that are asked of the Executive Officer, though they take different forms as they come from different quarters, each revealing some kind of misunderstanding.
People in the so-called "responding" churches are likely to ask such questions as "when will the five years of M. R. I. be over?" Those from the so-called "requesting" churches are still prone to look on M. R. I. as a quick answer to their wants - which are not always the same as their needs. Both kinds of questions spring from misunderstanding.
The questions from some in "responding" churches betray their notion that M. R. I. is a once-for-all financial appeal for $15,000,000 in five years, after which we can presumably all lapse into our previous habits of stewardship. Yet this is specifically denied in the document itself which says, with reference to these figures, "This should not be understood as a once-in-a lifetime appeal. It is no more than a first step forward, without reference to the longer range needs."
The questions from the "requesting" churches betray their notion that this is a wonderful way of gaining things that might otherwise be denied. Yet the document says that the figures referred to are "over and above our existing budgets and engagements, to meet already known needs. "
What does all this mean? It means that M. R. I. itself has little or no real reference to a specific sum or a specific time period, and that all efforts to raise that sum within that time can only be described as pre-M. R. I., that is to say, what is needed for M. R. I. to begin to operate at all. The sooner we understand this, the better for us all.
Again and again it has to be said that M. R. I. is not a scheme or a blueprint, much less a financial trick, but a description of what the church - the whole church - would look like if it really were in fact what it is in intention - the Body of Christ.
Thus M. R. I. is, on the one hand, nothing new - certainly nothing that began in Toronto in 1963. It is the attitude of the Church as it appears in the New Testament, where one part of the church ministers to another in its needs, and where "if one member suffer, all the members suffer with it". Similarly on the other hand, M. R. I. does not end in 1968 or whenever the five years are said to run out, but an ongoing process that will last till time shall end, and will go on as long as the church is called to be the Body of Christ in the world.
Isn't it time, therefore, that we looked again at the Toronto document? Leaving aside (for once) the specifically financial figure and specific time period. What does it really call for?
I have space only for reference to a small part of it. For example it says, "We must undertake a comprehensive study of needs and resources throughout our Communion. " We know something of the needs (and of wants too), but what church in the Anglican Communion has really studied its resources, or having done so, has indicated its willingness to share those resources, recognizing as the document says that "mission is not the kindness of the lucky to the unlucky; it is mutual, united obedience to the one God whose mission it is" ? The document goes on to say, "the form of the church must reflect that." Who would dare to say that it does?
Another example speaks of "a parallel commitment as to man-power." Has any church yet really looked at itself in this light? And if in the process that would mean fewer priests in one place than at present, and more in another, with a consequent recognition that this must inevitably mean a new look at the ministry of the laity, then that is precisely what the document says.
Is it too late for every church, every diocese, indeed every parish to look at itself afresh? It surely cannot be too late, precisely because this is what the church as the Body of Christ has continually to do. That is M.R.I., and we have not really grappled with it yet. We are still in the stage of pre-M.R.I., and we shall not get beyond it until we take to heart the fact that the Toronto document asks, "that every church seek to test and evaluate every activity in its life by the test of mission and of service to others, in our following after Christ."
There can be no further delay if we are serious about Christ's mission to the world, about which we talk so much. Sometimes I wonder if we are!