Review: A Gentle Bunyip: the Athol Gill Story, by Harold Pidwell (Seaview Press, 2007).
Athol Gill was arguably Australia's highest-profile Baptist New Testament scholar. When he died in 1992 from a massive heart attack at the young age of 54, memorial services were held in his honour at the Community Church of St. Mark (Clifton Hill Baptist Church) and Collins St Baptist Church in Melbourne; and in Washington DC, San Francisco, Liverpool, San Salvador and Zurich.
Athol was, according to his friends and enemies, controversial. He might be the only senior Baptist figure to have been voted out of office in two state denominational meetings (Queensland and Victoria). But he made history in Victoria by losing one Assembly vote (by just a few percentage points) then later winning by 90%! I was at that meeting, and, with many others, spoke for him. In essence my message then (and now): 'We must expect - indeed encourage - prophets to do whatever it takes to get our attention. But if we then persecute them for siding with the poor we'll have a hard time at the Judgment!'
Why did Athol Gill get up the noses of Australian Baptist conservatives? Three clues:
* His friend and colleague Graeme Garrett said of him: 'I knew Athol could be tough. He spoke his mind, not always tactfully.' When, in the 1970s, I was senior pastor of a middle-class church in Blackburn, Melbourne, negative comments used to float back to us via his students. (But in retrospect, yes, we did some good work among the homeless poor, but could have been much more radical in terms of social justice).
* He inveighed against those who armed themselves with proof texts and a 'flat Bible', and were not willing to wrestle with the diversity of interpretations in the various biblical sources. For example, the picture we have of the poor in the Chronicler, or early Proverbs, or John, is not the same as that in the pre-exilic prophets, or Jesus (especially in Luke). So how do we develop a valid hermeneutic about the poor from this range of emphases? Simple: we start with Jesus, and work backwards and forwards from his teaching and example, understanding how, for example, the theological viewpoint of the priests, Levites or cultic prophets influenced the books we know today as Joshua, Judges, I and II Chronicles etc. etc.
* Although Athol preached 'Good News for the Rich' as well as 'Good News for the Poor' the rich 'copped it' from him incessantly: it is 'difficult, if not impossible', for the rich who don't really care for the poor, to get into the Kingdom. More than once middle-class parishioners gave him an 'ear-full'. Despite a few texts in Proverbs which blame the poor for being slothful, the overwhelming message of the biblical prophets is that the poor are not destitute by accident: the systems of this world are biassed towards legally or illegally transferring wealth in only one direction. Was he a Marxist? 'No, Marx was too conservative!' Read Pidwell's book to figure that out!
And read it for an interesting commentary on what happens when a strong, charismatic leader exerts disproportionate power over others within a community (like endorsing or otherwise the choice of life-partners) or fails, despite his best efforts, to ensure a smooth leadership-succession. Read it also to follow the story of a renewed inner-suburban church: when Athol Gill wanted to baptize some converts at Clifton Hill Baptist Church, folks who'd been there for decades confessed they didn't know where the baptistry was!
When I read biographies of pastors/scholars/theologians I want to know how they came to their belief-system, what they did with their beliefs in terms of practical ministry, and what those who knew them best say about them as persons. Pidwell's offering is very good in the first two areas: but I would have liked more about Athol-the-man from a few others who knew him well - like his wife and children, John Hirt, Tim Costello, Rowena and Andrew Curtis, Ken Manley, Keith Dyer et. al. (But see the feschrift edited by David Neville, 'Prophecy and Passion: Essays in Honor of Athol Gill' for some more on Athol the man and his ideas: my review is at http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/2240.htm ).
I regularly use Athol's two main publications - The Fringes of Freedom and Life on the Road. But in the last 90 pages of this book Pidwell offers us a previously unpublished (and unedited, and replete with 40-50 typos!) essay by Athol titled 'Poverty and the Poor in the Bible' which summarizes his life-work as a scholar and teacher. Someone should write some discussion-questions to accompany Athol's notes for discussion-groups in our churches.
Pidwell's biography is must-read for anyone who wants to accompany one man on his journey as an advocate for the poor. What would Jesus do for the marginalized, the homeless, schizophrenics - the 'little people' - in a city like Melbourne? I think he would (again) have a bias towards these poor, like Athol did.
Review copy supplied by Ridley Melbourne Bookshop, http://bookshop.ridley.unimelb.edu.au/bookweb/
Come now & join the feast From the greatest to the very least Come now & join the feast Right here in the belly of the beast.
Patriots you can bring your flags, We'll be washing feet and will need some rags...
-- Shane Claiborne
I was privileged yesterday (29/7/2007) to hear Shane speak at aUNOHconference: a dynamic, sincere, and most interesting presentation. He's a terrific story-teller, humble person, and in my view, a prophet.
Shane is a founding partner of The Simple Way Community, Board member of the Christian Community Development Association, Author of The Irresistible Revolution (Feb 2006/Zondervan)
With tears and laughter, Shane unveils the tragic messes we’ve made of our world and the tangible hope that another world is possible. Shane graduated from Eastern University, and did graduate work at Princeton Seminary. His ministry experience is varied, from a 10-week stint working alongside Mother Teresa in Calcutta, to a year spent serving a wealthy mega-congregation at Willow Creek Community Church outside Chicago.
During the recent war in Iraq, Shane spent three weeks in Baghdad with the Iraq Peace Team (a project of Voices in the Wilderness and Christian Peacemaker Teams). Shane was witness to the military bombardment of Baghdad as well as the militarized areas between Baghdad and Amman. As a member of IPT, Shane took daily trips to sites where there had been bombings, visited hospitals and families, and attended worship services during the war.
Shane is a founding partner of The Simple Way, a faith community in inner city Philadelphia that has helped to birth and connect radical faith communities around the world, many of whom have become known as a “new monasticism”, which produced the book Schools for Conversion. These communities seek to follow Jesus, to rediscover the spirit of the early Church, and to incarnate the “Kingdom of God” -- a way of life standing in stark contrast to the world of militarism and materialism. At the Simple Way, their little revolution is lived out locally, as days are spent feeding hungry folks, doing collaborative arts with children, running a community store, hanging out with neighbors, and reclaiming trash-strewn lots by planting gardens. Shane and The Simple Way do much work to expose the fundamental structures that create poverty and to imagine alternatives to them.
Shane serves on the Board of Directors for The Christian Community Development Association, one of the largest national associations of faith-based organizations whose pillars are Redistribution, Relocation, and Reconciliation. Shane writes and travels extensively speaking about peacemaking, social justice, and Jesus. He is featured in the DVD series “Another World Is Possible” and is the author of the book The Irresistible Revolution.
Barack Obama speaks out on faith and politics: 'Call to Renewal' Keynote Address
by Sen. Barack Obama
[Note from Rowland. I like this guy. I happen to be a 'swinging voter' politically: I vote on issues and on the perceived credibility of the party/candidate. But from what I'm hearing/reading about this guy, I'm impressed].
Good morning. I appreciate the opportunity to speak here at the Call to Renewal's Building a Covenant for a New America conference, and I'd like to congratulate you all on the thoughtful presentations you've given so far about poverty and justice in America. I think all of us would affirm that caring for the poor finds root in all of our religious traditions - certainly that's true for my own.
But today I'd like to talk about the connection between religion and politics and perhaps offer some thoughts about how we can sort through some of the often bitter arguments over this issue over the last several years.
I do so because, as you all know, we can affirm the importance of poverty in the Bible and discuss the religious call to environmental stewardship all we want, but it won't have an impact if we don't tackle head-on the mutual suspicion that sometimes exists between religious America and secular America.
For me, this need was illustrated during my 2004 race for the U.S. Senate. My opponent, Alan Keyes, was well-versed in the Jerry Falwell-Pat Robertson style of rhetoric that often labels progressives as both immoral and godless.
Indeed, towards the end of the campaign, Mr. Keyes said that, "Jesus Christ would not vote for Barack Obama. Christ would not vote for Barack Obama because Barack Obama has behaved in a way that it is inconceivable for Christ to have behaved."
Now, I was urged by some of my liberal supporters not to take this statement seriously. To them, Mr. Keyes was an extremist, his arguments not worth entertaining.
What they didn't understand, however, was that I had to take him seriously. For he claimed to speak for my religion - he claimed knowledge of certain truths.
Mr. Obama says he's a Christian, he would say, and yet he supports a lifestyle that the Bible calls an abomination.
Mr. Obama says he's a Christian, but supports the destruction of innocent and sacred life.
What would my supporters have me say? That a literalist reading of the Bible was folly? That Mr. Keyes, a Roman Catholic, should ignore the teachings of the pope? More...
Billy Graham is a man of integrity, and during his life-time probably spoke face-to-face with more people than anyone in human history. His faith and ideas may be simplistic in some ways, but his essential message - that we need God's love and salvation and 'cleansing from our sins' - is the essence of what Christianity is all about...
Here some of his friends, especially Bono, pay their tribute to this great man:
Now my theology is a bit more 'progressive' than Billy Graham's, so what should I do with that?
Colin Morris, a modern prophet (and, incidentally, past President of the United Church of Zambia), in his challenging book Include Me Out: Confessions of an Ecclesiastical Coward says it well: 'Let it be so much as whispered that Billy Graham is en route for Britain to conduct evangelistic meetings and some of the best brains in the Church mobilize themselves to do a demolition job on him... A Church which can afford to pour that much energy down the sewer has too much time on its hands. And in the polluted atmosphere of clever malice that hangs over the Church at such a time, our claim to offer a Gospel of Reconciliation rings as hollow as the sales-pitch of a bald-headed man selling hair-restorer.'
Billy Graham made mistakes, and was willing to admit them. He had a too-conservative view of social justice issues early in his ministry, and started to agree with Jesus (! - see Matthew 23:23, Luke 11:42) later on. He had an appalling and very unChristain conversation with Nixon, for which he apologised when the tapes were released. And he once claimed AIDS was some judgement from God, which he also recanted.
Here's an interesting interview in two parts Woodly Allen did with Billy Graham:
More to come... including a tribute to Ruth Bell Graham elsewhere on this Blog
Note from Rowland: I was first introduced to M Scott Peck in seminary (Fuller, Pasadena, California) in 1982, via his brilliant book The Road Less Traveled. Well, it was brilliant except for one paragraph, as you'll see below. If you read that book you'll need to follow it with In Search of Stones.
Pop psychiatrist who ignored his bestselling advice on adultery
Christopher Reed
Wednesday October 5, 2005
The Guardian
Psychiatrist M Scott Peck, who has died aged 69, made millions with his first book by advocating self-discipline, restraint, and responsibility - all qualities he openly acknowledged were notably lacking in himself. The Road Less Travelled was first published in 1978. It eventually spent 13 years on the New York Times bestseller list to create a paperback record, sold 10 million copies worldwide and was translated into more than 20 languages.
The opening words were: "Life is difficult." This was a pronouncement to which Peck could personally attest. He spent much of his life immersed in cheap gin, chain-smoking cigarettes and inhaling cannabis, and being persistently unfaithful to his wife, who eventually divorced him. He also went through estrangement with two of his three children. Peck wrote openly of his adulterous affairs in another of his total of 15 books: In Search of Stones: A Pilgrimage of Faith, Reason and Discovery (1995), based on a visit to Britain to see ancient stone monuments. Never lacking in personal honesty, at least in print, he once said he had "the rare privilege of being able to give advice without having any responsibility".
Peck, whose personalised car number plate was THLOST, also spent much of his life seeking religious fulfilment (he was baptised a Christian at 43 after embracing Zen and then Sufism), and used this to explain his infidelities. "There was an element of quest in my extramarital romances," he wrote. "I was questing, through sexual romance, at least a brief visit to God's castle." Such visits, however brief, ceased when he became impotent, he disclosed.
The Road Less Travelled was written while Peck was running a successful private practice in Connecticut, but he received only $7,500 for publication after one publisher had dismissed it as "too Christ-y". Although a slow starter, its eventual massive success established Peck on the lecture circuit as well as confirming a valuable new genre for American publishers.
Peck was born in New York, the son of a lawyer who later became a judge. His education at the Phillips Exeter academy was unhappy and he later attacked its "Spartan, almost vicious adolescent culture". After psychological counselling, he moved to the Friends seminary, a Quaker school near Greenwich Village. There he read about Zen and became a Buddhist, but retained an ambition to write "the great American novel". After briefly attending Middlebury College, from where he was expelled for refusing the required officers' training classes, he entered Harvard thanks to his father's influence. He graduated in social relations and, despite his literary desires, began studying medicine at Columbia University before graduating from Case-Western Reserve University school of medicine in Ohio in 1963.
While at Columbia Peck met and married Lily Ho, a Chinese student from Singapore. This caused his father, who was half Jewish but always concealed it, to disown him (her parents disapproved, too). But he later relented and paid his son's tuition fees.
Then Peck joined the army because, he later said, he needed the regular pay to support his wife and a family; yet he also opposed the Vietnam war, then escalating. He rose to become assistant chief of psychiatry at the US surgeon general's office in Washington DC from 1970 to 1972, when he left the service with the rank of lieutentant colonel.
Years of private practice began and he incorporated case histories into the Road book and others. After its success he followed with another bestseller, People of the Lie: The Hope for Healing Human Evil (1983). It was well received by critics, but with reservations about "moral preachment". His books included two novels and one for children. Other non-fiction included The Different Drum (1987) and sequels to his first book, Further Along the Road Less Travelled (1993) and The Road Less Traveled and Beyond (1997). His last work was Glimpses of the Devil (2005), recounting his fascination with exorcism.
The success of his books was partly based on their mystical-spiritual content and although Peck always eschewed the idea of being a guru, there were cultish aspects to his popularity. Of this he said: "Half the time when people want to touch my robe, it feels incredibly icky - yuck! The rest of the time, it feels very good, honest, right."
He and Lily divorced in 2003 and he remarried last year. He is survived by his second wife, and his two daughters and one son by Lily.
Morgan Scott Peck, author and psychiatrist, born May 22 1936; died September 25 2005
In his biography of Thomas More, Peter Ackroyd tells how the Lord Chancellor of England was once asked to right a particular wrong. A beggar-woman lost her dog, which was then adopted by More’s wife, Alice, who became fond of it. The woman discovered where the dog was and claimed it back. More was not sure she really was the owner, so he told his wife and the beggar to stand at opposite ends of his great hall. The dog was placed between them. When it was released, it immediately ran to the beggar, whereupon Alice agreed that the woman was the rightful owner, but offered to buy the dog for a piece of gold. The offer was accepted, ‘so all parties were agreed; every one smiling to see [More’s] manner of enquiring out the truth’. (The Life of Thomas More, London: Chatto and Windus, 1998, p. 290) Would that all disputes, you may be thinking, could be resolved to such general satisfaction and by such a judgment of Solomon – even if it might be a bit risky to bring the cause of the dispute before the court!
More had, with typical homespun creativity, found a way of applying equity, which was his professional task as Lord Chancellor. The situation could not be resolved by recourse to the common law; what was needed was the application of prudential judgment in such a way that it went to the heart of the situation and enabled the dispute to be decisively resolved. You might even, following the reading we have just heard, say his judgment was inspired: ‘For the Lord gives wisdom… he stores up sound wisdom for the upright.’
Nothing is prised in the Scriptures above wisdom, for in wisdom there is ‘righteousness and justice and equity’, all of which are qualities of God. You can’t buy wisdom. It is, as we say of chocolate cake, ‘something to die for’. It comes from God and, together with righteousness, justice and equity, it is simply God’s gift. [from http://www.westminster-abbey.org/voice/sermon/archives/041001_judges.htm ]
~~~
I attended a scholarly lecture last night on this great man, and learned that:
* Apart from Shakespeare, he's the most-remembered English non-royal from the 16th century (and introduced as many words into the language as did the great bard). We know very little about Shakespeare, but a lot about More.
* His complete works - now available in print - fill a shelf 2 metres wide.
* His most famous work was, of course, Utopia.
* For most people More's death defined his life.
* He believed Scripture was compatible with Plato and Aristotle.
* He was not on a 'suicide mission': his 'refusal to sign' was not so that he would be venerated as a martyr, but to avoid being eternally damned.
* Some trivia: More may have been the first person to describe the 'death rattle'. He was fascinated by death and dying.
Sir Thomas More (later canonized St. Thomas More) is famous for his book Utopia (1515) and for his martyrdom. As Chancellor to Henry VIII he refused to sanction Henry's divorce of Queen Catherine. More was imprisoned, tried and executed. This drama was made into a play and an excellent (though not historically accurate) film - A Man of for All Seasons.
More is an excellent example of the early English Renaissance. He was friends with such humanists as Erasmus, John Colet, Thomas Linacre and others. Renaisance thinkers were mainly concerned with four ancient schools -- Aristotelianism, Platonism, Stoicism and Epicureanism. The alliance between Platonism and Christianity was as old as Saint Augustine, but had been revived in the Renaissance by Marsilio Ficino. Aristotle had been Christianized by St Thoma Aquinas. Christianity and Stoicism had many close connections from early on. Epicureanism was being Christianized by Lorenzo Valla and Erasmus. This process was to be continued by Pierre Gassendi.
More coined the term "utopia" which is a pun meaning both "good place" and "no place." More's Utopia is discovered on a voyage to the newly discovered Americas. It is thus one of the first books to invoke the analogy between the great voyages of discovery and discoveries of the mind. Plato's Republic and the Laws provide models for More's reflections on the good citizen and the good state, but More's Utopia is significantly different from these models and blends a variety of philosophical influences. In contrast to the Platonic Republic, More's society is a communistic democracy and not an aristocracy with communism confined to the ruling elite. The new emphasis on the philosophy of pleasure comes from More's understanding of Epicureanism. From the Stoics More gets the notions that mankind form a natural commnnity and the assumed existance of natural law.
More's Utopia established the genre of philosophical utopias much the way in which Montaigne and Bacon established the essay as a philosophical form.
James S. Stewart's Walking With God, (Regent College Publishing, Vancouver, 2006) is one of the best books of sermons I've read.
Evangelical Scottish Presbyterian James Stewart was voted in a survey conducted by preaching.com as #1 English-speaking preacher of the Twentieth Century. I’d agree. I’ve listened on audio-tape to his most famous sermon ‘The Wind of the Spirit’ and been enthralled. I’ve also read several of his books on preaching (eg. Heralds of God), and his theological tome A Man in Christ. All brilliant.
You can use this combination of qualifiers for James Stewart: Scottish, Presbyterian, Evangelical, Scholar, Saint, erudite, marvellous communicator, humble, very human. Know many others do you know like that?
He was a ‘saint’. A colleague, Professor Thomas Torrance wrote: ‘I will never forget the day when, after some bitter words by one of our colleagues in criticism of others, we saw the tears rolling down Jim Stewart’s cheeks; the silent, gentle, but powerful rebuke of a saintly man of God’ (p.10). ‘The first duty of a minister,’ Stewart wrote in a hand-written letter to a friend in 1984, ‘is to be a real man of prayer. Nothing one can do for God or man is so important as that.’
He was evangelistic. That is, he called for a commitment. Like this: ‘In this solemn hour of a dying year, [here’s] an urgent question. If you haven’t ever quite settled it, will you not, before this year is gone, look into Christ’s eyes and settle it – now? You have your choice. ‘O friend’, cried Augustine, ‘join thy heart to the immortality of God’ (p. 41).
He was pastoral. See, for example is beautifully sensitive sermon on Life’s Handicaps (pp. 203 ff).
He was conservative: he castigated the ‘newest of new theologies trying to define the image of God in ways quite alien to the Fatherhood revealed by Jesus’ (p. 96). He didn’t like commentators who ‘explain away’ Jesus’ compassion for children, for example. He put them on his knee ‘not because he wanted to teach his disciples a lesson (just fancy! There are some pedantic witless commentators on the Gospels who tell us solemnly that Jesus took the children to his arms in order to impress the disciples, to make a theological point! I think not’ p. 100). And he was sometimes old-fashioned (sexist language, old hymns, KJV, phrases like ‘John Bunyan’s pilgrim hirpling along…’ etc.)
He was evangelical but not ‘hard Reformed’. For example he advocated the use of one’s imagination in prayer: ‘Don’t be suspicious of that. It is God’s gift to you, and you are meant to use it.’
He was very wise: ‘The fact that a soul can be concerned about [the sin against the Holy Spirit], can be worried and troubled about it, is an absolutely infallible proof that that soul has not committed it… Nothing, no blackest, shamefulest shape of sin need stand unpardoned… (Would Jesus, who bade Peter forgive seventy times seven do less himself?)’
He loved the great hymns of the church: in every second sermon he quoted from them.
He used varying structures: occasionally he’ll have a I, II, III format, often not.
Very occasionally he’d be alliterative (eg. the character/cause/courage/confidence/crown of thanksgiving, from Psalm 138).
He was sometimes graphic: ‘A great open plain where an army bivouacked beneath the stars. All around the camp, before darkness descended, a line of sentries was drawn; and now through the darkness there are steady eyes gazing out into “no man’s land” beyond…’ (See pp. 71 ff. for the rest of the story!). Or this story: ‘I remember reading of a hero of the Chinese rice-fields during an earthquake [tsunami]. One day he saw from his hill-top farm the ocean suddenly receding, like an animal crouching to leap, and he knew the leap would be a tidal wave. And his neighbours working in the low fields would then be swept away. Without a second thought he set fire to his own rice-fields and furiously rang the temple bell. His neighbours saw his farm on fire and rushed up to help him. Then, from that safe height, they saw the swirl of waters over the fields they had just forsaken and they knew their salvation and its cost. So Christ, our watchman, has given us salvation by his sacrifice, and life by his death.’
And he loved using illustrations, which as every novice preacher is told, ‘are like windows: they let the light in’. Most of them are from the Bible itself; many are quotes or stories from the literary classics. He assumed in his congregations a knowledge of the Bible which we can’t take for granted any more.
Great sermons: if you want to read first those I reckon are the best, go to ‘Singing the Lord’s Song in a Strange Land’, ‘The Challenge of Life’, and ‘What is the Sin against the Holy Ghost?’
Some quotes I marked to return to:
‘Those who have entered into fellowship with God have entered a new eternal quality of being; and for those who have entered into eternity, death is simply an irrelevance’
‘The God of our joys is the God is the God of our sorrows too. The God who was so near to you that day when the world was radiant and your heart was singing, and it was good to be alive, is the same God [who is with you] when the foundations of things have been knocked to pieces… The God of the hills is the God of the valleys too’
‘”This,” cried Perpetua, one of the loveliest, fairest souls of the Early Church, just in her twenty-second year, when they led her out to die in the Carthaginian arena – “This is the day of coronation”… And there was that great shout the Grassmarket in Edinburgh heard when James Guthrie had climbed the scaffold – “This is the day the Lord has made: I will rejoice and be glad in it… ”
“Ah,” said the great artist Dore, looking at a picture of Jesus he had just finished, “I would have painted him better if I had loved him more.”
Said Alexander Pope: ‘Blessed are those who expect nothing, for they will never be disappointed’.
“These Christians,” growled Nietzsche, “these Christians must show me that they are redeemed, before I will believe in their Redeemer.”
‘Wordsworth, in his poem “Intimation of Immortality”, declared we all come at the first “trailing clouds of glory from God who is our home”. (Stewart quoted this at least twice in these sermons).
‘The Indian mystic Rabindranath Tagore: “Here is a violin-string, lying on my table. In a sense , lying there, it is quite free. Only – it is not free to sing. But look! I take that string, and fix it into my violin. I tighten it up. Now it is bound. It is not free any longer. But now for the first time, it really is free – because it is free to sing”.’
‘It is not the Word of God that is on trial: it is the man who reads it. And if he can’t find God speaking there, it is not the Bible he is judging: it is himself. He has nothing to draw with and the well is deep…. Jesus never said “Blessed are the critics, for they shall find God in the Bible.” He said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God”.’
‘There are three distinct experiences [in the life of faith]: emotional… intellectual… moral.’
‘You’ll search the Gospels in vain for any record of a woman who ever failed [Jesus] – there wasn’t one.’
‘Before the scientist can get going at all, he has to postulate two tremendous hypotheses – one, the rationality of the universe he is investigating; the other, the reliability of the mental processes he is using…And what are these twin postulates but just faith – faith at its most splendid and most daring…. Faith is not credulity. It is unbelief that is the credulous thing, the ultimate irrationality.
A book worth reading slowly (it took me a month to linger here and there as I read it). Rowland Croucher May 2007.
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