Friday, August 13th

 

CAN INTEGRITY BE FOUND IN

 THE INSTITUTIONALISED CHURCH?

A CEO of a world-renowned bank and investment firm revealed at a press interview his uncommon practice for hiring leaders in his organization. This CEO invites job candidates to breakfast and arrives early to make sure the restaurant messes up their order. The reason he does this is simple: to see how the candidate responds. In his words, he wants to "look inside their heart." It seems that the CEO is most concerned with the character and integrity of the person he is considering for a leadership role in his company.

The Christian Church does not lack leaders who have credentials in the fields of Theology, Pastoral and Church management. However, the institutionalized church is faced with a very grave problem about their Clergy who are the spiritual leaders of the flock. The Church does not seem to be sure of what is "inside the heart" of these leaders. Their "lack of private integrity has become the source of their public indignity." The Church seems to be starved of leaders whose integrity is beyond doubt. Complaints of swindling of money, sexual misconduct, abuse of power, discriminatory acts in Church administration have come against great names of renowned preachers, Church leaders, megachurch builders—the list goes on and on.

The meaning of Integrity in Latin and Hebrew languages

The Latin word Integritas come to us from an ancient Roman Military tradition. In the ancient Roman Military practice, there was an act of inspecting the breastplate worn by soldiers. During the inspections, the Centurion would come in front of each soldier and the soldier has to strike with his right fist, on the breastplate shouting "integritas". The sound will demonstrate whether the breastplate is solid or not to protect the soldier from the thrust of a sword or arrow.

Therefore "Integritas" in the Latin language means:

·   soundness

·   (material) wholeness, completeness, and entirety.

The Hebrew word תֹּם tôm has the following shades of meaning:

·   complete, sound,

·   undamaged

·    precision.

·   faithfulness, trustworthiness.

Looking at these, we understand that Integrity is to do with the very fabric of a person's character and heart. It is about an undivided wholistic person, who is not soiled or corrupt where "sincerity and honesty are its end products". Such Integrity is an attribute that should be occurring constantly in a cleric and should not alter with the changing of circumstances.

The problem with Church leadership today is: even with solid Theology and Biblical foundations, we sadly stumble on moral compromise in our Church Leadership at all levels. In this article I share with you a few examples:

The Church seems to be rushing through the process of disciplining and restoring.

During our school days, we would have seen some students who forged the signature of a parent or School Teacher getting caught and been expelled from the School, because it is a criminal offence. If this happens in the Church what would the Church do? You might ask me; “does it happen in the Church?”. I have to sadly say "yes" because it happened to me while I was the President Bishop of my Church. To have my signature forged was more painful than any of the "brick brats" I have been hit with during my years of service. While some were in agreement in suspending the clergyman from churches' ministry, there were a few who were in a mighty hurry to get the person back into ministry.

The institutionalized Church seems to be encountered with a problem of affecting the profound meaning of repentance and restoration as taught in the Scriptures. Several Clerics have gone into very serious errors, truly repented and have been restored over a considerable period of time in keeping with the Biblical teachings. But some clerics have made it a habit to repeat the same error, admit and repent when caught in the act and then recommit it. Sadly the entire ministry period becomes a repetition of this vicious cycle. The mechanism to give more time and a testing period to check on the fruit of repentance is becoming more and more unacceptable in the Church disciplinary process. The gracefulness of the Church is fully usurped by these clerics, at the expense of the Integrity of the Church.

 

At times the Church lacks bravery to defend and seek justice for the victim

All most all churches have Codes of conduct, Charters and Conventions to protect the rights of victims of sexual abuse, violation of human rights, discrimination etc. However, most of the Churches have them only in the printed format on the office shelves. They never come out of those shelves when there is a complaint made against a cleric.

I once listened to a Church leader who had serious difficulty in removing the Clerical Collar of a very senior cleric as part of the disciplinary action. The offence was very serious as he had outraged a woman during a Pastoral call. The Church leader went on to say "supposing this naughty senior cleric dies tomorrow, there won't be a Clerical Collar around the neck of his dead body". The "powers that be" made some Irresponsible decisions which was a clear indication of their "herd mentality". It brutally deprived the victim of receiving justice from the Church. The victim has visited annually; the Head Office of the Church accompanied by her professional counsellor to ask "Where is justice for me?". But those visits never awakened the "sleeping giant". Nothing was done from the side of the Church to recompence and heal the wounded victim.

Another flaw that damages the integrity of the church is when clerics, as well as laymen, fear to stand up in exposing the malpractices in the church. Though they have seen such things happening before their own eyes, they have turned a blind eye due to the fear of reprisals, at times even from their superiors. There are also situations where they refuse to come forward before an inquiry and give evidence as a witness. All these happen due to countless fear they have of :

• being cut off by the rest of the church community
• becoming a target for attack or mudslinging by those who do the wrongdoing
• losing popularity in the Church
• losing opportunities of gaining support for future endeavours i.e., Church leadership.

Such fears undoubtedly affect the integrity of the church. When the wrongdoings by those in the church go unchecked, eventually, they can be the norm. While investigating a financial scandal in a Church I had to trace the history behind the serious malpractices that had taken place on the collection counting table in the Church’s vestry. A member of the same church from overseas informed me, how several years ago a lay leader of the said church had been the author of the same malpractices when counting the Sunday collection. It had been known to the clergy and other lay leaders who kept a blind eye because the particular lay leader had direct access to higher echelons of the Church.

It is not surprising to hear some church members' refusal to financially support the church's ministry work. I fear the future of an institutionalized church, which will face financial constraints because of a lack of faithful stewardship and integrity in the church.

          

The Church lacks men and women who are ready to admit and confess their fault

The Clerics have a divine obligation to preach against sin and call others to repentance. But when the call to self-examine and repentance comes their way, there is denial. In my pastoral experience, the most unwilling and unrepentant sinner is not seated on the Church Pew but standing on the Church Pulpit. Such Clerics turn out to be self-righteous who can be so blinded by his own pride that he doesn't even see the sin in his own life. However, they will be very good at recognizing the sin in others before they see it in themselves. My hunch is, it is the work of the evil one seeking to wreck the sanctifying process of character development in a Church leader's heart.

The initial experience of "being born again", "being called" by God elevate them to a higher pedestal which makes them think, "I have arrived". Little do they realize that they have only begun a long journey of allowing God to fashion them through a process of sanctification. The necessity to work with the Holy Spirit for constant renewal to become who God wants them to be is not perceived. A person who is called to serve God must not see themselves as people with super-spiritual knowledge. They must be encouraged and trained to work towards their spiritual maturity. St. Paul warns, "giving too much authority too early" can result in arrogance. A believer who is too quickly placed into a position of leadership can become proud and fall into sin. Christian Clerics are not marvellous spiritual beings who are perfect. They must be made aware of the continuous struggle they will have with sinful habits after coming to faith in Christ. Though Jesus never sinned, he faced temptations and stresses while carrying on the Kingdom work. If it happened to our Lord and Master how come we say "no it is not so with me?". Even St. Paul a mature servant of Christ wrestled with temptation as written by him Romans 7:18–20. Christian workers must become more aware of their own shortcomings so that they would become less arrogant. If the Church is to maintain its integrity, it should not look for spiritual giants but people who are willing to be constantly renewed until they become like Christ. If the Church does not consider it as a priority especially regarding their clerics, it runs with the high risk of arrogance and failure.

 

Lack of role models to emulate Integrity in the institutionalized Church

If there is one thing that the Church needs right now, it's men and women of character who can say with Paul, "Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ" (1 Cor. 11:1). In my experience, I have witnessed the lack of role models in the field of Theological Education which is a major problem.

In a Church, there had been several Candidates who applied to pursue their studies in a Seminary that offered full bright scholarships to read for a PhD. At the interview, they were asked to make a 10-year commitment to teaching in a Theological Seminary after completing their PhD. Sadly a majority of them pulled out in pursuing their PhD studies in hearing this requirement. What was the problem? Their desire to do a PhD was to have the three letters behind their name because they were more interested in joining the race to climb the hierarchical ladders of the church. They were not willing to teach for 10-years, not the entire ministry period and help the formation of young seminarians. There are instances where teachers in the seminaries have suddenly left because they were not offered the highest post to lead the institute. What a bad model to the students under their guidance?

Many Theological Schools have suffered by not having dedicated teachers who are focused on being role models for their students. Aiding the students to cheat at exams, favouritism when marking answer scripts of students, providing exam mark scripts to Church authorities without the designated examiners receiving the answer scripts for marking are some of the sad stories I have heard not only at Theological Schools but also in the local churches. This seems to be a pattern that is invading the institutionalized Church due to a lack of commitment to do a dedicated job and be a role model.

When it comes to elections, the church, has become the most erroneous model before the world. Ugly forms of canvassing, contracting deals, “campaigning for leadership” using Sabbatical leave has become the norm to get into the seats of power. I know of a Church leader in Sri Lanka who declined to sign together with an umbrella organization of Churches, a statement asking for Free and Fair Elections from the Government. The reason was his conscience, which was not clear at all, to say his Church was a good election role model before the country. 

A crucial point that I have struggled with while in Church leadership is when it comes to effecting transfers of Clerics to various Churches. Certain Clergy are in high demand while some are not wanted by any of the Churches. At times I have had to keep some names of ministers on hold as they cannot be fitted into any Church because of their bad reputation. This is a very hurtful experience for the Church worker and also the family. Maybe the Church is at fault for not looking deep enough to “what is in the heart” when recruiting men and women into Churches' ministry.

The Methodist Church I represent has seven long years in testing out a person before ordination. Yet we seem to have taken in people who cannot be presented as role models in the Church. Altogether about eight times a Methodist candidate has to testify to God's Call to the Ministry before the Ordination, yet they lose the sense of calling as the years go by even though some might climb ladders to hold high office in the Church. Some people have been "pushed" into the ministry by another Cleric merely to take pride in saying "I have brought so many people into God's ministry". A well experienced senior colleague once told me "Guard the Gate" when recruiting persons for ministry. This is the reason why Paul exhorts Timothy to "keep a close watch on yourself and on the teaching. Persist in this, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers" (1 Tim. 4:16). If we ignore any erosion in our integrity, we could find ourselves in the rubble of our own implosion and destruction. Eric Geiger illustrates this through the two techniques that can be deployed to destroy a building. The first technique is to demolish a building "from the outside with wrecking balls", which is visible to everyone and catches no one by surprise. The second technique is to demolish the building from inside the building by strategically placed explosives that weaken the integrity of the structure. This second type of demolition is not immediately obvious to onlookers, but, as the structure weakens, the building will eventually collapse. Often, we highlight the persecution upon the Church from external forces. But what goes on inside the Church, sans integrity is suicidal!

St Paul in writing to young Church Leader, Timothy describes the requirements of church elders (Spiritual Leaders). 1 Timothy 3:1–7 "Those who are placed in high leadership positions within the church are to be men

·   of good reputation,

·   known for self-control and fairness,

·   having an ability to teach spiritual truths.

·   who cannot be known as drunkards,

·   who are not bickerers,

·   not prone to greed,

·   who are faithful to their wife and

·   who are having respectable control of their children."

Looking at all this, we have to honestly ask whether the institutionalized church is starved for role models. I have not written this article because I am the right kind of role model. I am still examining myself without being self-righteous. I agree with Paul and say “I am the worst of sinners".

In conclusion, I share with you these words that have inspired me: "One of the greatest legacies we can leave for those who have been placed under our charge is to come to the end of our lives 

and be able to say that we pursued a life of integrity, we feared God, and we turned away from evil in the power of the Spirit".

Rev. Asiri P. Perera

July 1, 2021