There is a story of St. Francis of Assisi sitting beside the Pope of his time as a grand church procession proceeded past them. Seeing all the splendor and the glamour of the banners, vestments, and communion vessels of precious metals pass by, the Pope said to Francis, “I suppose it is no longer possible for the Church to say, ‘Silver and gold have I none.’”
Reflecting on the grandeur, Francis replied, “And I suppose that neither is it possible for you to say ‘Rise and walk.'”
This referred, of course, to the familiar story from Acts 3.
Acts 3 Now Peter and John went up together to the temple at the hour of prayer, the ninth hour. And a certain man lame from his mother’s womb was carried, whom they laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful, to ask alms from those who entered the temple; who, seeing Peter and John about to go into the temple, asked for alms. And fixing his eyes on him, with John, Peter said, “Look at us.” So he gave them his attention, expecting to receive something from them. Then Peter said, “Silver and gold I do not have, but what I do have I give you: In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, rise up and walk.” And he took him by the right hand and lifted him up, and immediately his feet and ankle bones received strength. So he, leaping up, stood and walked and entered the temple with them—walking, leaping, and praising God.
Of course, while the Biblical record is certainly reliable, it is much more difficult to know if St. Francis actually had this conversation with the Pope. We may have to be content to say that it is the kind of thing that it seems that St. Francis would have said, or perhaps even should have said.
In any case, the dynamic is one that is all too observable in institutions. After the planting stage, where zeal and perhaps even miracles abound, there comes a time of institutional consolidation where experiences have emblematic expression. Over time, expression replaces substance. In our apocryphal St. Francis story, the procession which passed by had signs and symbol aplenty. As generations passed, the institutional memory of God’s intervention faded into liturgical expressions of the truth which had been evident in the founding years.
While it is easy to be critical of Rome centuries ago, we do the same thing. We do it in personal relationships and we do it in institutions. Many couples watch the life ebb out of their relationship because they maintain signs and symbols of union but do not attend to the heart focused zeal that characterized their actions in their early years.
Institutions do the same thing. Where there is an “all in” style of commitment when getting started, before long, institutional structures are put in place to celebrate what God has been doing in the first years. The next stage is that they remind us of what God has done in our history. Eventually, it is all too easy for the symbol to become reinterpreted.
I had a friend who was posted as the new vicar at a church in an English village, following the very long-term service of his predecessor. After his first service, parishioners came to him furious that he had disrespected the niche statue of “the Holy Mother” at one side of the altar rail. Being new, he had no idea what they were talking about. Being newly ordained, he had never even heard of the practice of venerating the statue of Mary during the administration of Holy Communion. He tried to calm the church members down and got in contact with the Priest who had retired to ask him about it. At first, the older cleric had no idea what the new Vicar was talking about but soon burst out in gales of laughter.
“I think I know what happened,” he said with mirth. “Years ago, we scrimped and saved to get new carpet at the altar rail and chancel step. It had been the practice in the Parish for me as the priest to share the host with each person then get the chalice to communicate people in the other specie. My shoes rubbing across the new carpet caused a huge buildup of static electricity. For a couple of Sundays I shocked people when I offered them the chalice. As a result, I took to touching the radiator at the end of the altar rail in order to dissipate the static The radiator is just under the niche statue of the Virgin Mary. I never told the people what I was doing. They must have assumed that my touching the radiator under the statue was some form of veneration of the Virgin. In fact it was only my attempt to discharge static electricity! Ironically, even though the carpet is long faded and frayed and not producing static electricity, your failure to touch the radiator wound up shocking the people even though there were no sparks!”
At their worst, institutional symbols become transformed into meaning something entirely different than they were intended to mean. Along those lines, many churches emphasize many fine activities but don’t much pursue the Great Commission and rarely, if ever, lead anyone to faith in Jesus Christ. At its worst, the church can actually become an enemy of what it was created to do. That is what happened in The Episcopal Church. It is an increasing problem in Canada, Brazil, parts of the Church of England and other Provinces as well. It is shocking.
There are two paths out of this quandary. The first is a commitment to being intentional in making the “first things” first. We can choose to maintain the priorities that our Founder mandated. We can choose to be faithful to the Great Commission and the Great Commandment, loving people with the full weight of the Gospel. This is the course that GAFCON/GFCA is taking. The Global Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans (GFCA) has made disciplemaking its priority.
There is another course that is possible. When the Church falls short in fulfilling its purpose, the surrounding culture becomes hostile to it. Eventually, persecution can rise. While persecution is painful, it has a wonderful result; it calls people to return to their first love. In the West, we are seeing the bubbling rise of rejection of our values. We are increasingly coming under criticism of the pagan, Muslim, or material world. Eventually, that criticism breaks out in outright persecution. Some Christians have already seen this. In fact, I read last week that the rate of Christians being killed for their faith doubled in 2013 over 2012.
The good news is that the Good News cannot be snuffed out, even when Christians are killed. Some will survive and will stand up for the truth. As for me, I want to strive to be part of the kind of Church that can say, “Rise and walk!” I’ve learned that from Christians in nations that now make up GAFCON/GFCA, and I’m thankful for their tutelage.
The following article by Bishop Bill Atwood first appeared in the January 14, 2014 edition of the AAC’s International Update. Sign up for this free email.
