Bishop Allin Speaks on Social Issues
Diocesan Press Service. May 2, 1975 [75162]
ELY, Nev. -- "The Church is being more rhetorical than it is being missionary in relationship to the way it handles social concerns," said Presiding Bishop John M. Allin, at the convention of the Diocese of Nevada in Ely on April 12.
Asked if the Church shouldn't just forget about involvement in political issues, Bishop Allin said that the Church does a lot of talking to relieve a sense of frustration about social concerns. "The Church would be better served if it stopped standing up to piously let the world know it's on the side of right. I think it would be better to assume that we want to be on the side of right, and instead of debating about whether or not we should be doing something, try to use more energy working on our strategies and logistics," he said.
Bishop Allin said that his concern was that the church not end up being a debating society with a posture that looks like it's passing judgment regardless of the issues it chooses to debate. " I think what we really need to do is to put our energies to work and find people to go out and help -- to work for social change in the climate of freedom and support, acceptance and understanding. This calls us to a renewal of the ministry where we can give ourselves and move out and share the life of identifying and relating to people, " he said.
Bishop Allin went on to say that if the end result of social concern is spiritual pride then that's not good. To maintain a balance and a sense of perspective is what's really needed, he said.
" There are many times when political involvement and social concern are a both/and rather than an either/or situation. For example," Bishop Allin said, "just fasting may be benefiction, but ask yourself, can you now do something in addition. In what you have not consumed in the food situation, can you somehow find a way to share it with somebody else? Don't visualize just the hungry one across the world. What you didn't eat you can very likely get to your hungry neighbor easier, " he said.
"One of the difficulties I find is that we insist in this world in taking things apart rather than in putting them in context. We insist in isolating rather than relating and the name of the game is relation. Christ's mission is to reconcile us with God Himself and to enable us by His grace to be related to one another -- tedious as we may be -- so that we can see these things in their relationships and in their perspective and context rather than simply isolated and in sharp focus," the Presiding Bishop concluded.