Consultation Presses for Recognition of Ministry by All Baptized
Episcopal News Service. June 30, 1999 [99-094]
(ENS) Hundreds of people descended on a college campus in southern Minnesota June 9 to press the church for a broader recognition of the ministry of all baptized Christians, based on the Baptismal Covenant.
Part rally, part reunion, part political strategy consultation, participants in the "Living the Covenant" consultation at St. Olaf College in Northfield were welcomed by Fred Putnam, the retired bishop of the Navajoland Area Mission, who expressed incredulity that the planners' hopes for 200 had swelled to over 450 and many had to be turned away.
The consultation was the "long-held dream" of the Rev. Boone Porter, said the Rev. Juan Oliver of Associated Parishes, one of the sponsors. Porter, who chaired the planning committee, died days before the meeting convened but his spirit clearly infused the proceedings, largely because of his conviction that "how you worship profoundly determines how you do mission," said Oliver.
In his keynote address on the renewal of ministry, Prof. Timothy Sedgwick of Virginia Seminary said that Porter was "a central character" in the development of the concept of "total ministry," one of the "visionaries and collaborators" who passionately believed that those qualities "remain essential to the deepening of our faith and the development of ministry."
In offering an "aerial view" of the developing concept of total or collaborative ministry in the last 25 years, Sedgwick quoted the late bishop of Nevada, Wes Frensdorff, who described an "emerging church" as one "where there is no clerical status of Christians and no classes of Christians" but a church where "all together know themselves to be part of the laos -- the holy people of God."
That church, Frensdorff and others believed, would be "a ministering community rather than a community gathered around a minister" Clergy would be present "for the sake of ordering and signing the church's life and mission, not as signs of authority or dependency, nor of spiritual or intellectual superiority." Clergy, including bishops, would support a pattern of "ministry supporting church," building a servant church that would be "so salty and so yeasty that it really would be missed if no longer around," in Frensdorff's vision.
The vision seeks to "draw us back from a clericalized, institutionalized church seeking its own self-preservation," Sedgwick added. And baptism is the crucial initiation into that community of faith. "Ministry is then not something the ordained do or that which is done for the sake of the church," he said. "Ministry is the life of faith lived out in the world." The development of ministry must therefore deal with what is needed to "make this understanding a reality -- what needs to be changed in the governance and canons, in liturgy and worship, in opportunities for service, in education and formation, in the role of the ordained, and in spirituality so that the connections are made and life in relationship with God is deepened," Sedgwick said.
He used the development of ministry in Alaska as a case study where Bishop Bill Gordon became "increasingly aware of paternalism and the need for truly indigenous leadership," taking steps that created a new system in the church, one where local faith communities "bore their own life in faith, where leaders from the community were raised and supported to serve the common life of the community." The direct result was the ordination of 32 persons identified by their own communities as leaders. "The dramatic character of the change was marked by the increasing sense and claim that the church in its life and ministry was the congregation," Sedgwick said.
Gordon's vision of what is now called total ministry developed and spread to other dioceses because "systemic changes in the church were made of a sufficiently large scale that the organization, structure and vision of the church was itself changed," Sedgwick observed. It broadened the church's understanding of authority and leadership, education and training and the understanding of the role of the congregation and it spread as a movement.
While on a trip to southeast Asia, Boone Porter was introduced to the writings of Roland Allen, who offered "a theology of the Holy Spirit and the church which challenged as it inspired critical and constructive thinking and action about the church and ministry," as Sedgwick described his impact. Central to Allen's missionary strategy was a church that is "self-extending, self-governing and self-supporting because these characteristics arise from the nature of Christian faith." Allen supplies what Sedgwick called "an originating vision for the development of ministry" as it emerged in Alaska and elsewhere.
That vision was substantially supported by the liturgical renewal movement because "the understanding of Christian faith, the church and ministry at the heart of the liturgical movement provided the vision and language central to developments of total ministry," especially the importance of baptism and its place "at the center of the Christian life while the Eucharist was understood as expressing what was central to that life."
The liturgical movement provided "the language of baptismal covenant and the subsequent framework for developing understandings of ministry and holy orders that critically enlarged and extended the development of the movement of total ministry from its beginnings in Alaska with the originating vision of Roland Allen."
Expanding on Sedgwick's observations, the Rev. Charles Wilson pointedly asked in his keynote on The Order and Exercise of Authority in the Church, "Can we come up with a vision of the church as a truly awesome channel of the fire and wind of God's authority?"
In exploring the concepts of leadership, authority and structure and how they function in the church, he began by contending that "there are too many people who equate leadership with control." But this is "very nearly the opposite of true leadership," because a leader is "one who inspires and unites the corporate effort with a powerful vision and then keeps the people free to pursue that vision in their own God-given creativity. In other words, the leader gets out of the way, fully expecting to be surprised and delighted in what happens," he said.
Wilson said that authority is "power that is recognized and accepted by the organization... power blessed or found acceptable or right to the community, as distinct from coercive power or the naked force of the bully." Using the Gospel of Matthew to express his concept of authority, he said that "all true authority is God's authority. It has nothing to do with status, corner office, orders, titles or vestments." And we must recognize that "there is a gracious abundance of authority blossoming all over the place, in ways that often surprise and delight us." A good theology of authority will "encourage such freedom and the enjoyment of seeing the freedom of others, as gifted people of faith, shining forth with God's power."
Structures, Wilson concluded, should "keep people free so they can take up their ministries according to their gifts and the call of the Spirit."
In the third keynote, Deacon Susanne Watson of Iowa said that her excitement about the consultation revolved around the questions, "What if all the organizations that have 'ministry' somehow as their focus all came together in one place? What if there were an opportunity for all the ministers of the church to gather and talk about how it is that we're redefining,. how we're reclaiming the meaning of ministry?"
As a member of the board for the North American Association for the Diaconate (NAAD) and the planning committee for the consultation, Watson explored her concern for how the church forms people "to move into ministry and orders, particularly through worship, spiritual development, education and training."
The true value of the meeting, she argued, was in the individuals with different perspectives, "bringing different eccentricities and gifts, all concerned about what we do with the rest of our lives after rising from the waters of baptism." And yet all share an interest in "moving away from a consumer-provider approach to being the church, moving away from being communities gathered around a minister to ministering communities."
Dozens of workshops catered to the interests of participants, addressing a wide range of theological and practical issues.
In a forum sponsored by Associated Parishes, for example, Bishop Mark MacDonald of Alaska picked up on the missionary vision of Roland Allen, suggesting that it stemmed from his frustration with the meager results of mission efforts in light of the promise. Allen concluded that something was terribly wrong -- that missionaries themselves were prevented from hearing their own Gospel because of "hidden assumptions and cultural barriers." Unfortunately, MacDonald, asserted, "It hasn't changed a bit."
As evidence he pointed out that the "number and participation of ethnic minorities is going down and the overall picture has been bleak," largely because "the hidden assumption is superiority of those who bring the message." He concluded, "The Gospel is greater than what we intend...and the one who thinks he brings the Gospel turns out to be the one who needs it."
"The church is back but most people don't know it yet," said Arianna Williams, a young woman from Nebraska. For her the conference was a hopeful sign. Others were encouraged by the return of what they called "heart-based theology." Another said it was about time the church addressed "clericalism as oppression" and an obstacle to total ministry.
Several observed that the consultation represented "a series of movements joining hands" to build a more open and responsive church. What they share is a determination to claim the role and identity of lay people and to "dismantle some of the tyrannies of ordination."
Bishop Tom Ray of Northern Michigan said in his sermon at the Eucharist that the church is in trouble if it expects "exaggerated saintly witness" from the one percent of its ordained membership and "zip" from the other 99 percent. "Is it any wonder the Episcopal Church is experiencing a deep malaise, paralysis?" he asked.
Ray said that "all the baptized find it difficult, if not impossible, to see deep significance in the lives of all and each of us. We really believe that the seminary-trained and ordained are the real serious Christians, even though we do know better." Too often "low self-esteem" among lay church members interferes with ministry. "Is it any wonder the church turns many people off, turns many away?"
He stressed that "servant ministry is not the domain, the territory, of the ordained. Servant ministry is how we care for our family. It reaches out and deeply into being a public servant...." A shift in understanding of ministry, what Ray called an "antidote to the paralysis of clericalism and anti-clericalism infecting the body of Christ," is called Mutual Ministry in his diocese but "would better be called the recovery or the revelation of mutual baptismal ministry."
The Rev. Melford Holland, whose Office for Ministry Development also supported the consultation, described it as a "wonderful new meeting group" that brought together a variety of perspectives. "It is a bit like tossing seeds on the ground -- no one knows what will grow," he said. And yet he sensed tremendous power in the stories that were shared and the enduring connections that were forged.
"We got a glimpse of the future," Holland said, "people coming together from different perspectives around the issue of the ministry of the baptized and how we live out the Baptismal Covenant in our daily lives."
The Rev. Ben Helmer, director of the church's Ministry with Small Churches said that "this consultation demonstrated how much energy there is around collaborative ministry development in churches of every size." He said that the meeting also demonstrated "a pressing need for information about collaborative ministry and how to go about it."
In a closing session, participants were clearly looking for ways to extend the connections, to "build on the commonality of what we are doing." One person said that the meeting "brought the fires together." One suggested that participants look for ways to meet on a regional or diocesan level. In a flash of reality, someone else wondered "where are the other groups committed to total ministry, like the conservatives and charismatics? There are more friends out there."
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