I read with fascination an article in the latest journal from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, my alma mater. It’s the Fall 2011 volume 137 number 4 issue. The article is by Erik Herrmann and it’s about mercy. On first reading what was going through my mind was “it is possible to think too much”. However upon further review I realize this article raises some questions I’ve had in my own mind over the last few years. If I’m getting Prof. Herrmann’s point, the issue for him is whether or not it is possible for churches as institutions to relate to others “mercifully”. In other words is the word “mercy” something that only should be applied to God and individual Christians in a narrow context (after all Jesus said, “blessed are the merciful”), and specific instances such as a scenario like the “Good Samaritan”?
Prof. Herrmann writes –
When God is described as “merciful” it is a beautiful thing. Yet what happens when we use the term “mercy” to describe our actions towards our neighbor, or the churches orientation to the world? Are we to picture the Christian as one who is accustomed to a position of privilege? Is the church comprised of those who have the upper hand and thus from that place of luxury to be gracious and merciful to a disadvantaged world? Interestingly, Paul writes that God did not choose the privileged – the rich, the wise, and the powerful – but the weak, the poor, and the foolish. So is “mercy” the right word?
As I said before my first reaction to the article was “it is possible to think too much”. What difference does it make if we choose “Witness, Service and Life Together”, or instead of service use “compassion”, or leave it as it is? Prof. Herrmann, after asking “is “mercy” the right word?” goes on to say, “Yes, and no, or maybe, or “why do you want to know”? My question is “why is he asking”? What is it here that has gotten into Prof. Herrmann’s craw, and does it make any difference?
Well, words do mean things, and it is always been my contention that part of our problem, especially in the political realm is that we have lost the language. Case in point; when politicians talk about a tax cut and then run around asking everyone how they are going to “pay” for it. So if I am getting the point of the article, using the word “mercy” in the context that we see it in the emphasis from the Office of the President of the Synod, can lead to paternalist and perhaps even colonialist actions. At least we should spend some serious time talking about what we mean when we use the word and what the context is. I believe that a discussion of “colonialism” is a very timely one as well. Right now in areas all around the world, institutions that are affiliated with the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod are behaving like colonizers under the guise of “witness” and “mission” and sometimes “mercy”.
So Prof. Herrmann I apologize for my – “it is possible to think too much” – crack, and it is my desire to use your article as you suggest, as a “springboard for further discussion”. The whole orientation of Christians to the world around them is in need of discussion. The articles about Tim Tebowand how radio stations and talk show hosts deal with his Christianity raises the fact that much of the animosity in the culture against Christians and a Christian “witness” is that people do feel that we think that we have something that they don’t have and that we in some way “lord it over them”. The fact that we do have something that they do not is beside the point. Let’s have a discussion and I hope others will chime in as well.
Rev. Seter,
Thank you for this post. I appreciate your thoughts and the time you took to further some of the points I raised in my op piece in the most recent Concordia Journal (for those reading along, it is also posted at ConcordiaTheology: http://concordiatheology.org/2011/11/compassion-mercy-and-diakonia/). You rightly note that the piece is really about the church’s posture to the world and how language can shape that, rather than a particular commentary on how we should translate “diakonia” in synodical literature. I view the synodical emphases as a welcome opportunity for deeper reflection on the church’s calling and work, and so in my mind they invite neither direct criticism nor endorsement. Though there is a warning and criticism of potential paternalism/colonialism, I gather from your post that you are in a better position to comment on that vis-a-vis the Synod than I am. Still, I think there are stories from our history that probably need to be remembered and recounted in this vein.
My thoughts on this topic grow especially out of my teaching and work with the deaconess program. I teach a class at the seminary called “Theology of Compassion and Human Care” for deaconess and M.Div. students. There we take on a healthy dose of church history before looking into contemporary issues of poverty, immigration, care for the marginalized, mission work, etc. While there are many bright spots in that history, the church’s role in caring for those in need has arisen from quite different rationales, and the effect has not always been salutary. We all know that Jesus warned against the dangers of self-aggrandizement in the giving of “alms” (a word that has its roots in the Greek, “eleēmosynē,” derived from “eleos”–“mercy” or “pity”), but boasting is not the only danger. In the Middle Ages, almsgiving began to be tied to a system of merit, so that “the poor” were instrumentalized. That is, they were not so much the object of Christian love and care a they were a means to an end, a path towards personal salvation. The result was often a nasty perversion of Christian charity, with “works of mercy” (opera misericordiae) now the context for the selfish spiritual gain of the rich, while the poor would grow in their disdain for those who had greater means. Luther and the reformers helped to change this entire orientation of mercy and generosity so that the neighbor was lifted out of one’s feverish striving after salvation and could become the genuine object of love for the neighbor’s sake. Still, because of our sinful proclivities all of these dangers in giving remain real and current. Because we are a Western church—an American church—we have the advantage of wealth and power over almost everyone else. The LWF has been accused of bankrolling their particular theological agenda among churches in the third world. That same temptation is always there for us as well. So how do we help others as brothers rather than benefactors? How do we keep our Christian love focused on people rather than on impersonal categories like “the poor” or “Africa” (see, for example, my comments on the “disabled” in an earlier post: http://concordiatheology.org/2011/10/hauerwas-and-disability/)? These are all challenges which require constant sensitivity and self-reflection. Most importantly they require us to listen to others, especially to those who do not share our wealth and influence. It seems to me that vocabulary choices and changes are small potatoes compared to this larger goal.
So, as you say, “what’s in a word?” Well, to me these word choices only become a significant issue if they are turned into ends in themselves rather than a way to explore and realize more fully what it means to live as the body of Christ. I am not a student of the synodical emphases but they seem to acknowledge that each area of the church’s life—martyria, diakonia, koinonia—informs the other. Even the logo suggests this overlap as one color bleeds into the next. Perhaps I find it helpful to linger in these places of overlap, these spaces where the hues mingle and blend. It is there where community, compassion, and Christ intersect that I discover the complexity and richness of the church’s calling.
Am I “overlapping” with any of your thoughts or experience?
Let’s not be too hasty. My guess is that it’s entirely possible to excessively ruminate about a term, even to the point of intimating that, when the term is employed by a high-level Synodical executive, it actually hides a twisted “colonizing” agenda by big pappa. Perhaps it does, though. The thought does have a certain appeal, beyond its political usefulness in the next election cycle. After all, unconscious perversions were once the very bread and butter of classical psychodynamic psychiatry; although now that stuff is largely dismissed by the cognitive-behavioral therapists and insurance companies alike. Some say it’s because of the intolerable expenditure of coin and time needed to fully lay bare the soiled human soul, by the technique; but you know, I have this perverted thought that the its fall from grace has occurred because it speaks to the truth about the human state, and the truth is very much perceived as a distasteful smudge on our own narcissistic looking-glass.
Besides, Freud was a misogynist while yet uncomfortably attached to his mother. So what does he know?
Looking at Mt 25, it appears that the interpersonal acts of the faithful … whether such behavior comes to be labeled as deed s of “mercy,” “compassion,” “service” or (heavens!) “diakonia” … were not matters of great intellectual dissection, by the beings segregated on the right of the returned Master. On the contrary, the wooly undead are portrayed by the blessed Evangelist as having been thoroughly animated to engage in … [being conflict avoidant, I’ll let you choose and insert the politically correct word here] …, by some inner life-generating force, without much in the way of a tainting perverseness. The Master even goes so far as to say that they did any number of wonderful things unto Him, to His benefit and comfort; and the flock’s response to this news is something on the order of head-scratching, from the clan of the utterly clueless. Not one gracious “You’re welcome” or “Think nothing of it (because we certainly didn’t)” is spoken. It’s as if the sheep weren’t aware of the Master’s presence, much less the august Concordia Journal’s, in the course of their humble lives. But that’s impossible, of course. Chances are they had simply stacked the latest issue on that growing pile in the corner of the basement, maybe pausing to devour a book review or two while on the stairs – all this before proceeding to offer a little child a cup of cold water; or maybe a fish; or that 21st century cholesterol time-bomb otherwise known as the egg. Being sheep, though, they will have been heedless of the danger that these behaviors will be regarded, by the wise, as an encroaching “paternalism.”