Mutual Irresponsibility
Diocesan Press Service. May 7, 1965 [XXXII-3]
Ralph Dean, Executive Officer, Anglican Communion
"Mutual Irresponsibility" is the disconcerting title of a pamphlet (SPCK 2/-) by Douglas Webster, the Theologian Missioner of the Church Missionary Society in England. Let it be said at the outset that Canon Webster is no critic of M. R. I. as such. His preface makes that clear, for speaking of his pamphlet he says "It is not a critique, direct or indirect of the Toronto Congress on Mutual Responsibility or Interdependence. I would wish to endorse every word of that document, knowing a little of the spirit which inspired it and the situation it was desired to meet". Let it also be understood that few people have as much right to write about the Anglican Communion as he. Canon Webster spends the greater part of his life in traveling around the Communion, teaching and preaching wherever he goes, and placing clergy and laity in his debt in place after place. As such he deserves to be heard, and his contribution should have a real part in the thinking of any who are concerned with the working out of M. R. I.
He takes a text from St. Paul and makes it a burden of his own concern:" and, apart from other things, there is the daily pressure upon me of my anxiety for all the churches. Who is weak, and I am not weak? Who is made to fall, and I am not indignant?" (2 Cor. 11. 28, 29, RSV). He goes on to say: "But although this is a splendid aim, we are a long way from attaining it, for not only is the whole concept of mission gravely misunderstood; by some it is virtually being renounced. My purpose here is not to defend the concept of Mission which ought to be sufficiently compelling to any sensitive reader of the New Testament, nor to rescue it from perpetual distortions, but to point out a way in which Mutual Responsibility is being interpreted in some circles - and with the highest motives - could very well become tantamount to mutual irresponsibility with devastating results, exactly the opposite to all that is envisaged in the Toronto document. This is the irony of it, that a newly awakened sense of responsibility could, through sheer innocence and ignorance of the facts, turn into the utmost irresponsibility. Such irresponsibility can arise from doing the right things in the wrong way; from being over-generous or over-humble; for failing to be realistic about both giving and receiving; from a too-ready assumption that a local or national Church will always know what is best for itself; and from underestimating the vast differences that exist between the various branches of the Anglican Communion."
Three main areas come under his scrutiny. Men and Money, Giving and Receiving. Bilateral or Multilateral Relations. He has no doubt that men matter more than money. He warns us against thinking that we can discharge our responsibility in mission by financial generosity. He says: "I am wanting to urge a sense of priorities which puts staff before plant, men before equipment, and persons before money. Of the two I have no doubt whatever which benefits the Church more in the long run. It is not unlikely that the congregation in Corinth would have found many uses for the equivalent of 1, 000 and would have preferred such a sum to the tiresomeness of the Apostle Paul with his exacting standard and his relentless gospel. But which would have been better?" Canon Webster is no starry eyed idealist. He knows that men cost money, but he wants us to view money properly; "I would suggest that if we are to be mutually responsible, gifts of money, whether large or small, should always be sacramental and not substitutionary. Money is substitutionary when a church gives in such a way as to avoid any real involvement at the level of persons; money is a substitute for persons which it will not give or will not spare. Money is sacramental when a church gives in such a way that it gives of itself, its prayers and its members, the money going with a because of the people whom it also gives". Nor will he let us get away with the over-simple idea that the West gives money and the other Churches other things: "It is degrading for any church merely to receive and not to give money outside its own borders. Some of the younger Churches have already recognized this and have undertaken to give money towards projects in the West. This is of enormous spiritual and psychological significance. It is imperative if mutuality is to mean anything. It is of equal if not greater benefit for us to receive from this new source. Nothing brings more shame on a well-fed man than to be obliged, as I have been, to accept a gift of food from starving village Christians in India. Nothing is more likely to shame the affluent Churches of the West into real giving than to receive such costly gifts from Churches that are truly poor".
Canon Webster warns us too against the naive idea that the younger churches can fulfil their obligations by sending their clergy to the West, though he recognizes that there are situations where this can be of the greatest value. In his eminently quotable book he says:- "What right have we to encourage or induce clergy from these Churches to leave the people who need them so deeply in order to help us who already have so much I am not for a moment implying that they could not help us; we know they can. I am arguing that we have no right, even in the age of M.R.I., to make this kind of request or demand until the crisis in the ministry in Africa (where it is acute) and in Asia is much nearer solution". He sees the dangers of diocese - partnerships and the possible fate of those overseas dioceses that for some reason are less fortunate than others in linking up with Western dioceses, and he knows the spiritual peril involved for the Western diocese if this kind of partnership limits its vision or its sense of responsibility towards the whole Church. In most of his 20 pages he focuses a trained and experienced mind as well as a missionary heart on many areas of obvious concern. Perhaps he will one day expand the last page or two and thus help us more positively in our understanding of M. R. I. He ends like this: "Let us raise all the money we can and do our utmost to encourage a revolution in Christian giving, providing always that we realize the severe limitations of money in achieving spiritual results unless it is given in this context of knowledge, prayer, and service. The aim of this essay is not to ask for less money but to plead that its giving be in the right context, and for that reason to urge the higher importance of these other currencies. There is less cause for anxiety about a Church which has little money but which knows something about the power of prayer and has a sense of mission, than for a Church which is well supported financially but knows little of prayer and has no sense of mission. Without these priorities and perspectives we could well fall short of the vision set before us in M. R. I. and instead enter a new phase of mutual irresponsibility, ignorance, and ineffectiveness. "
It all reminds us of what we are always in danger of forgetting - that M.R.I. is not a program; not a blue print, not a do-it-yourself kit for mission, but a gate to be gone through, a process to be experienced - a document that first must be allowed to speak to our hearts and then to involve all there is of us - not just our pocket books - in the service of Christ in His Church.
Bishop Bayne commented as follows about Canon Webster's booklet - "I think it is a searching study of some of the central problems of inter-church relationships. The M. R. I. Commission in its first Statement to the Church points up sharply the temptations and dangers to which Canon Webster refers. It is a helpful addition to the growing dialogue about the deep meaning of Mutual Responsibility. "