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ALIENATION
OR
RECONCILIATION?
Early in 2004 the Australian Federal Treasurer, Mr Costello, told
Australians that it would be good for the nation if people continued to
work well beyond the retirement age of 65.
His comments attracted a great deal of attention, including statements
from businessmen and business councils, newspaper articles and editorials,
and floods of ‘letters to the editor’.
Hard realities were soon raised in a wide
variety of circles.
With job shortages, and increasing
unemployment for retrenched over-40s, many regarded the Federal
Treasurer’s comments as political ‘pie-in-the-sky’ rhetoric.
Writing in a secular workplace setting and
from a secular perspective, Kevin Murrell, in a newspaper letter to the
editor, stated strongly:
‘…Business and the
professions are overrun with jumped-up little creeps posing as new
management. Sometimes they clutch shiny new MBAs but they have little
experience of the organisations they invade. They have no respect for
older workers, reviling us as dinosaurs, past our use-by date etc.
When we resist their
wild innovations we are told we are afraid of change and ignored. Our
reasoning and experience are dismissed out of hand as being merely
rearguard actions to protect our entrenched privileges and easy lifestyle.
The new generation
of managers has no respect for age, seniority, experience or past
loyalty. They also have no commitment to the organisations they nuke.
Their sole point of reference is their own careers
[sic].
Who cares if older
workers are humiliated, ridiculed and driven out of their employment?
Long before the organisation starts to pay the price for the wholesale
destruction of jobs, skills and working relationships, these fellows are
out, on their way to greater things up the corporate greasy pole.
That’s only about
those of us who still have jobs in our 50s. At least we keep our
salaries. But if you’re pushed out or dumped and you have the unlikely
good fortune to find another job you get the honour of doing the most
menial tasks for wages which you haven’t earned since a teenager. If you
don’t want to, you’re a job snob…’
(quoted by
permission)
This letter raises issues of hurt and
concern at the treatment of those over 40 in the work force – hurts and
concerns that have been confirmed by others formerly in management and
other positions in industry and commerce. That such attitudes should
continue to demean and disfranchise many who have made significant
contributions to business and society in our general communities is a sad
reflection of the times – and offers little encouragement for the future
of society (as strange is it may now seem to the very young, one day, they
too will be over forty and older).
Even worse than this tragedy of warped
people values and attitudes in the general community, is the sad reality
that the Church, the Christian community, has not escaped contamination
with the same distorted values.
If people, who have experienced such hurts
in the world of business and commerce, come to the church to seek solace,
they could be extremely disappointed, discouraged and disenchanted. Too
many churches are no different to what is reflected in Kevin Murrell’s
letter.
In our January/February 2004 TACL we
stated:
In recent years, at
CCG Ministries, we have been receiving more and more expressions of
concern and hurt about leader/pastor control and manipulation within
mainstream churches, and not just in cults or extreme Christian fringe
groups.
Since the Protestant
Reformation there has been an emphasis, in major parts of the Christian
Church, on the Priesthood of all believers and a rejection of a special,
elitist ‘clergy class’. That seems to be changing – even in churches that
held such a mutual ministry view as a major denominational distinctive.
The growing emphasis
has been on a CEO model of leadership in congregations – with the Pastor
or Senior Pastor having almost ‘supreme’ power and authority. Some have
demanded submission and acceptance of all their ideas, suggestions and
decisions – including those made with little or no consultation with
others. Their concept of leadership seems to be that they are there to
lead and everyone else must follow and obey – or get out.
Many ministers seem more familiar with,
and have more understanding of, secular-related business management
principles, including (now already commercially outdated) notions of
business CEOs, than with a sound Biblical understanding and worldview.
George Barna, US Christian polster and
researcher, reported in 2003 that only 9% of American Christians who could
be described as ‘born again’ actually held a Biblical worldview. Only 7%
those who were generally described as Protestant held a Biblical
worldview.
Subsequent follow-up research of American
senior pastors revealed a disturbing correlation. Only 51% of Protestant
ministers, in general, held a Biblical worldview – a view in which the
Bible is regarded as authoritative for today’s Christian; Jesus is
regarded as sinless and divine; God is believed to be all-knowing and
all-powerful and salvation is believed to be by grace alone.
Significant differences showed up in
various categories or statistical divisions.
America’s largest Protestant denomination,
the Southern Baptist Convention, ranked highest with some 71% of their
ministers having a Biblical worldview, while 44% of charismatic and
Pentecostal denominational pastors held Biblical worldviews, and
mainstream denominations, e.g. Episcopalian (Anglican) and Methodist
ranked much lower. Only 27% of Methodist ministers held to a Biblical
worldview, according to the Barna group.
While some 6% of all Senior Protestant
Pastors in the USA are women, only 15% of female pastors hold a Biblical
worldview, as compared to 53% male pastors. Racially, 30% of Black
American Senior Pastors, compared to 55% of White Senior Pastors. Having
had a theological college or seminary training, interestingly
(disturbingly?), was no help in developing a consistent Biblical worldview
– only 45% of seminary graduates held a Biblical worldview, compared to
59% of pastors who had not been to seminary.
Barna believed that what church leadership
does not have, it cannot pass on – either through teaching or example and
modeling. His comments give some disturbing insights into church trends
at present and for the future. While his research is focused on the USA,
Australia (and several other countries) usually follow similar trends and
conditions some years later.
Perhaps this lack of a Biblical worldview
is one of the significant reasons for so many churches having divisive and
destructive leadership struggles. Perhaps it is also a major contributor
to the increased problems of marginalisation occurring in far too many
churches.
In our January/February 2004 TACL we also
stated:
Along with
expressions of concern about leader/pastor authoritarianism and control,
CCG Ministries has been receiving an increasing volume of expressions of
concern from middle-aged and older Christians who feel ignored,
marginalised and rejected in congregations where they have faithfully
served for years, and where they still would like to be actively
involved.
Why are so many good and godly Christians
feeling disenchanted, disfranchised and marginalised in so many churches –
and often by the young adults for whom they worked and made sacrifices in
the past?
Why are so many ministers telling older
Christians that they need to move out of their comfort zones and give up
aspects of church life and worship, which are meaningful to them, for the
sake of the young people and their potential growth and commitment? Why is
this rarely balanced with an emphasis to the young to give up some of
their comforts and likes for the sake of the older Christians who have
helped the church to be there for them today? Why are there so few
visible/noticeable efforts to encourage some mutual compromise and sharing
on both sides, and teaching and programmes to help both young and old to
learn from each other and grow together?
Churches that focus mainly on youth,
without teaching youth to respect, and build relationships with, older
members of their fellowships, do a disservice to both young and old. The
youth will miss out on, and not learn to appreciate, a rich heritage of
history and experience (including lots of interesting stories), and the
older members will feel unwanted in the church, as well as in society
generally – which is in contradiction to the claims of Christ’s gospel.
Paul tells Timothy that no one should
despise his youth – but at the same time strongly states that older people
should be treated with respect (read 1 Timothy). Peter, advising elders,
whom he addresses as a ‘fellow elder’ – even though he was one of the
Twelve Apostles – calls for mutual respect and humility, and includes a
call for young men to be submissive to those who are older (1 Peter 5).
Christians have been given a ministry of
reconciliation – not alienation! It is no good talking about
reconciliation of those outside the Church if we have increasing
alienation inside the Church. (See 2 Corinthians 5:1-20.)
In the 1960s there was a great deal of
discussion regarding the ‘Generation Gap’. Government departments,
community groups, churches and others, conducted programmes and seminars;
published books and other materials; provided counselling for families and
young people; and generally worked to lessen the gap and emphasise the
importance of whole family units, rather than separate family segments.
It sought to counteract the American commercial emphasis on youth as a
separate and more significant section of society.
How quickly such lessons from the past are
forgotten.
The Bible clearly reveals that the Gospel
of Jesus Christ is equally available and relevant for all, regardless of
race, culture, gender or age. To emphasise one section of society (in the
community at large, or in the faith community – the Church) is to distort
the Gospel, warp the Biblical worldview and value of all people, and leads
to increased alienation instead of reconciliation.
ALL this is from
God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ
and gave us the
ministry of reconciliation.
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