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by Professor S. Ratnajeevan H. Hoole

The Good News

Happy New Year! The season of Advent that we just entered marks the New Year on the Church calendar. In Advent we prepare for God's birth as Man.

Christmas marks the centre-piece of the Christian faith - God sent his Son to die for our sins. The knowledge of that infinite love that God has for us, makes Christmas naturally a time of festivity. We will surely go through with Christmas trees, Santa Claus, carolling, Christmas cake and all that.

Advent is a time of reflection and preparation for that great celebration.

It is a time of internal renewal, for taking stock; for answering questions such as: How have we as a Church borne witness to the Good News that we celebrate? How have we reflected through our lives the transforming power of that Good News?

Preaching the Good News

Today we face many dilemmas as Christians, but I wish to focus on three that I see as the most challenging. The first concerns Jesus' departing commandment that we preach the Good News and make disciples of all nations.

However the Christian duty to evangelise has created controversy. It is claimed that conversions are bought and unethical. We of the mainline Churches have responded defensively - "We do not convert; it is the new free Churches that do that." A bishop in turn has instructed his priests "Evangelism yes, Conversions no." We have been congratulated by the Sinhala Commission for our position. At the ground level Christians are confused. If we have Good News, would not our love for our fellow men prompt us to speak it? Or is the Good News no longer Good News? Not only is this about fulfilling Jesus' Last Commission, but our inaction negates our faith and leads to the Church losing her members.

We believe we have something of great value and wish to share it. To not do so is to be selfish. Those who agree that what we have is of value are free to convert. We believe that God tells us to serve mankind through good works, the same good works that resulted in schools and hospitals. When we do good works, sometimes people come to us only for the things we offer. It can't be helped. Should St. Thomas' College be shut down because some unscrupulous people will become Anglicans to gain entry?

We Christians need to take the bull by the horns. Conversions are a part of mankind's heritage. Some will always be for bad reasons. Was not Devanampiya Tissa, the son of the Hindu Mootha Siva, himself a convert? Did the rest of the kingdom truly believe when it followed him? Dr. Sarath Amunugama, as astute observer, has used the term "Donoughmore Buddhists" to describe those who converted from Christianity to Buddhism when the Donoughmore Constitution effectively conferred political benefits. Even today, we see many members of the Burgher and Tamil Communities becoming Sinhalese Buddhists. It is surely their right, is it not, to choose their identity?

Unity in Common Core-faith

The second challenge comes from Jesus Christ's command that we love one another as He loves us and be one body. We all love one another, yes, Roman Catholics, Anglicans, Methodists, Pentecostalists, Congregationalists and what have you. We all have a common core-faith as defined by the Catholic Creeds. We do things together, just as different members of the same family run different homes with differing life-styles, but are united in brotherhood and shared activities. However, total agreement on practices is impossible. Enforcing an impossible uniformity becomes possible only by saying personal faith is not important to the believer, only outward appearance is. Faith plays second fiddle to unity and this poses the problem as remnants of articles of faith are soon jettisoned. At our major mainline Protestant Church's Council recently, for example, the Chief Guest declared that the idea of God the Father sending his Son to die for us, preaches retributive violence and is like saying that the Father murdered his Son for someone else's sin. This negates all revelation starting from Adam, and mocks the Eucharist.

Thus we see that by seeking outward unity, we sow religious anarchy and the seeds of disunity. For no believing Church can surrender her faith for such a union. Faith would become an amorphous undefined thing. Faith must be at the centre. We need to live and work with other Churches on things we can do together, like united brothers with their own separate families.

Equality and Church Authority: Justice and Forgiveness

The third challenge arises from non-contradictory tensions within Christianity. The Bible demands justice for equally created humans even as it specifies a hierarchy of elders within the Church with divine authority.

Positively the Church has had its proud moments when just elders (or Bishops or Popes) upheld the divine order. On the downside, the divine authority given to elders has been misused to place Church elders beyond accountability. Thus it is possible to have Bishops under whom priests and the laity grovel and suffer while the Church externally runs schools and preaches love, justice and rights. A challenge increasingly facing the Church is sexual child-abuse in her institutions that is covered up. The offender is close to the Church hierarchy or has priestly authority, so it is embarrassing. And besides, there is unlimited forgiveness for the sinner.

So we gladly speak, instead, of the Church having to confess to and seek forgiveness for her role in slavery, cooperation with Hitler and misuse of the eco-system, and such other vague and cost-free things that we can congratulate ourselves about.

A case at the leading girls' school in Colombo has already been investigated by a child-rights crusader who has reported the evidence from tearful children. The Church's Board, it appears, has "forgiven" the principal but her exploited children are still under her authority. What then of their rights? Are these matters for the Police only when the offender is outside the Church? A respected former minister on the Board has alerted many in authority to the plight of the exposed children but it seems it is the principal who will receive the protection of the Church. It is a replay of a Lake House Editor's experience. He remarked bitterly in his column that the priest who exploited altar servers in Colpetty and then gave them 5 cents for peanuts was, a generation later, a senior priest with children still under him. We must forgive, but can no longer leave them in authority. The Church must not preach justice only to the world outside. There are similar issues to be addressed. Do we as a Church fete our powerful lay-friends who are known to have presided over killings in the Northeast even as we preach Peace? Do we have members in high Church office who cooperated in neutralizing JVP-ers in the dark days of this country?

Conclusion

The Body of Christ hurts and haemorrhages when we cannot resolve these tensions. St. John the Baptist, the man we remember most in Advent, tells us "Prepare the way of our Lord and make his paths straight." Let us do so this Advent. 

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