Dear Wikkid Person,
Shunning, Church discipline, whatever you want to call it. A very broad
topic, I realize, but one I find confusing at best, life destroying at
worst. Since you have been on the receiving end of said shunning, how do
you think it should have been carried out? Or should it even have been
carried out? I have always felt that generally one of two things happen in
a shunning situation, and neither help the shunned. One, they are kicked
out, and no one knows how to reach out, so no one does. Two, sympathy
and "you poor thing" are extended, thus making those who felt the shunning
was necessary out to be bad guys. In almost all cases, the shunned person
is never back to happy church fellowship.
topic, I realize, but one I find confusing at best, life destroying at
worst. Since you have been on the receiving end of said shunning, how do
you think it should have been carried out? Or should it even have been
carried out? I have always felt that generally one of two things happen in
a shunning situation, and neither help the shunned. One, they are kicked
out, and no one knows how to reach out, so no one does. Two, sympathy
and "you poor thing" are extended, thus making those who felt the shunning
was necessary out to be bad guys. In almost all cases, the shunned person
is never back to happy church fellowship.
My questions are: (despite the fact every single situation is different)
1. How do you think someone in an ongoing sin, presumably mentioned in
1 Corinthians 5:11 should be treated? Should they be shunned at all?
1 Corinthians 5:11 should be treated? Should they be shunned at all?
2. Who determines if they really repented or are just sorry for being
caught....I mean, if i don't know them well personally, should I contact
them myself? What if I meet them on the street and they are supposedly
still in an adulterous situation...maybe years later(Allegedly). Do I
say, "Yo bro, are you still sleeping with?..." "Yeah, well get lost!"
caught....I mean, if i don't know them well personally, should I contact
them myself? What if I meet them on the street and they are supposedly
still in an adulterous situation...maybe years later(Allegedly). Do I
say, "Yo bro, are you still sleeping with?..." "Yeah, well get lost!"
3. How, if ever, should it be determined if something is worthy of
shunning if it is not mentioned in 1 Cor 5. I mean, presumably you wouldn't
want to eat the Lord's supper with someone who just offed their granny.
But murder is not mentioned in this chapter.
This is such a broad topic, that maybe there are no broad answers. But
still, any thoughts?
Looking for answers
Regards,
shunning if it is not mentioned in 1 Cor 5. I mean, presumably you wouldn't
want to eat the Lord's supper with someone who just offed their granny.
But murder is not mentioned in this chapter.
This is such a broad topic, that maybe there are no broad answers. But
still, any thoughts?
Looking for answers
Regards,
Willow Sage Shovel
Dear Willow,
[this bit inserted for people who lack the patience to read what follows: Let's say you're part of a Plymouth Brethren assembly. Your congregation represents, let us say, 10% of the Christians in your community. However, it does not, practically speaking, in any way acknowledge the other 90%. It has divorced itself from that 90%.
Then one month, there is a fight in your assembly. Your assembly kicks out a guy, effectively divorcing itself from him. You did this because he questioned an "assembly decision" he was not permitted to voice disagreement with.
Then some other guys side with him, so you kick out 50% of your assembly, saying the decision to divorce itself from all of them is an "assembly decision" and demanding that all other assemblies give support to your right to divorce yourself from anyone who doesn't agree. (Of course, you say you might take that 50% back, if only they would return and apologize for questioning your right to wield the power you feel you have.)
Then one of the remaining guys in your assembly marries a woman who divorced her husband fifteen years previous. So you say you have no choice but to "discipline" him by kicking him out/divorcing him. Because marrying a divorced woman is wrong. So you have to withdraw yourself from him, and kick him out. Any assemblies or people who question your decision will be divorced from you also, for not submitting to your assembly decision. Because you had to do this, right? Or your assembly will be tacitly giving support to evil, seen in splitting up that marriage. After all, what God hath joined together...What's wrong with this picture?]
This is all to say that I find no scriptural precedent for being "allowed" to enact a division. Ever. If you have made one happen (for example, by kicking dissenting people out and then demanding everyone support the power you think you have to make "assembly decisions"), you are in direct disobedience to scripture. You are false shepherds, further scattering the sheep. Your activities need to be addressed, rather than given tacit, silent support to. As you know, I don't believe that we can actually:
-take epistles written to the entire Christian community of say, Ephesus, a given city (which city isn't in our culture, time period or hemisphere, so exhortations as to the specifics of their situation certainly need "application" to us),
-and then divide our community up into countless "churches," in direct violation of all the "love" and unity directives seeded all through the epistles,
-maintain no real unity or communication or dealings with the other (majority of the) Christians in our city, choosing instead to pretend the few in our little splinter are all we're responsible before God to interact in love and light with,
-pretend that if we sort of do what the epistles sort of say, only on a micro level, and only with the Christians who are in our shard, instead of obeying it toward the local Christian community, as the apostle would have positively blanched to but envision,
-pretending that nothing the apostle wrote about "one another" or "a brother" or "you" applies to anyone outside our church membership roster, so we don't have to do it,
-and then not really have any strong, open or deep (love) connections to even the majority of the people who show up at the same street address Sunday morning
-make everyone toe/work the assembly line, under threat of being ostracized/shunned
-and then not really have any strong, open or deep (love) connections to even the majority of the people who show up at the same street address Sunday morning
-make everyone toe/work the assembly line, under threat of being ostracized/shunned
...and then having so done, somehow claim to be "following scripture" at all. I think we need to stop thinking that. Pretending that. Claiming that. Thinking we are excused from "love" scriptures if we later find we have to "follow" the "light" ones.
"I didn't treat him with warmth, compassion, openess or honesty. I made less connection to him at church than I do with the tellers at the grocery store. Good thing, too. Later it turned out that he was going to divorce his wife!"
Our rebellion against the "love" scriptures helps cause people to slip through the cracks, and also disqualifies us from having any bench from which to judge them when they do. And leads us to seek to judge smaller and smaller and smaller things, all the while being less and less and less connected (love) to less and less and less of the Church as a whole. We want "light" (to zap others with) and to not have to actually do the love stuff. But we sure do complain if anyone is "negative" about us and our group. We lash out. We punish.
"I didn't treat him with warmth, compassion, openess or honesty. I made less connection to him at church than I do with the tellers at the grocery store. Good thing, too. Later it turned out that he was going to divorce his wife!"
Our rebellion against the "love" scriptures helps cause people to slip through the cracks, and also disqualifies us from having any bench from which to judge them when they do. And leads us to seek to judge smaller and smaller and smaller things, all the while being less and less and less connected (love) to less and less and less of the Church as a whole. We want "light" (to zap others with) and to not have to actually do the love stuff. But we sure do complain if anyone is "negative" about us and our group. We lash out. We punish.
I think the shattered bits that we Christians work and gather in, make it impossible to actually collectively do any of the New Testament group stuff (love or light) scripturally. We are floating on those shattered pieces of the ship, having a heated argument about if it's okay to paint the poopdeck purple or if it must remain traditional brown.
If we are willing to split (and oh, are we willing to split, and remain split, and pretend the other Christians are not Christians/are dead, for the rest of our lives, which we will then piously live, all the while praying for and expecting blessing from God) then we have a bigger problem than an adulterer here, or an extortioner there. Bigger, deeper, more crucial problems. Problems which the epistles were intended to prevent, if only we'd obeyed them. If only we took them seriously enough to change our behaviour. To repent of it.
I see any kicking of an individual Christian out into that "La la la, we can't hear you" land, the one where we keep all the other Christians in the world, as part of a more painful, more widespread, damaging problem/sin than the one that we're supposedly judging that person for. Why is there a "la la la, we can't hear you" land where we keep all the other Christians anyway? How is that okay? What we're doing is inarguably worse than what Mr. Adultery is doing. We are, collectively, big fat hypocrites when we punish Ms. Divorce for doing on an individual level what we're doing to much large numbers of people, collectively.
Yes. I think the collective community splitting and staying split is a more damaging sin than one man divorcing his wife. Or committing adultery. Hurts more people. More deeply. For longer. And disqualifies us from properly "dealing with" adulterers.
Should make us scale back our wording and understanding of exactly what we're doing when we, a divorced splinter from the other Christians in our town, deign to "deal with" someone in our group. For, say, adultery or divorce.
(And I'm no fan of adultery, though I think were I so inclined, that I could compete for Team Canada at the Summer Olympics in free-style adultery/triathalon. If I were so inclined. I think I'd suck at divorce, though. I'm not known for my ability to quit/let go.)
To elaborate this point: how exactly does this sinful ecclesiastical splitting make Christian groups ineligible to be judging people for things like splitting up their marriages? What's the connection? (and, I mean, we HAVE to punish people right? In the most harsh way we have? To start treating them almost as badly as we treat Baptists, Presbyterians and Pentocostals?)
Well, exactly how hypocritical do we think it isn't, to formally divorce ourselves from half the people in our assembly, then shun a man forever and never allow him to break bread again, because he went and married a woman who divorced (split from) her husband? We are doing that right now, as most know. You've got people who turn their noses up at the very idea of worshipping with someone who married someone who split up her marriage, meanwhile we are actively taking part in repeatedly splitting up entire enclaves of believers. Just like doing the latter does not come to bear on our fitness to do the former.
If we are willing to split (and oh, are we willing to split, and remain split, and pretend the other Christians are not Christians/are dead, for the rest of our lives, which we will then piously live, all the while praying for and expecting blessing from God) then we have a bigger problem than an adulterer here, or an extortioner there. Bigger, deeper, more crucial problems. Problems which the epistles were intended to prevent, if only we'd obeyed them. If only we took them seriously enough to change our behaviour. To repent of it.
I see any kicking of an individual Christian out into that "La la la, we can't hear you" land, the one where we keep all the other Christians in the world, as part of a more painful, more widespread, damaging problem/sin than the one that we're supposedly judging that person for. Why is there a "la la la, we can't hear you" land where we keep all the other Christians anyway? How is that okay? What we're doing is inarguably worse than what Mr. Adultery is doing. We are, collectively, big fat hypocrites when we punish Ms. Divorce for doing on an individual level what we're doing to much large numbers of people, collectively.
Yes. I think the collective community splitting and staying split is a more damaging sin than one man divorcing his wife. Or committing adultery. Hurts more people. More deeply. For longer. And disqualifies us from properly "dealing with" adulterers.
Should make us scale back our wording and understanding of exactly what we're doing when we, a divorced splinter from the other Christians in our town, deign to "deal with" someone in our group. For, say, adultery or divorce.
(And I'm no fan of adultery, though I think were I so inclined, that I could compete for Team Canada at the Summer Olympics in free-style adultery/triathalon. If I were so inclined. I think I'd suck at divorce, though. I'm not known for my ability to quit/let go.)
To elaborate this point: how exactly does this sinful ecclesiastical splitting make Christian groups ineligible to be judging people for things like splitting up their marriages? What's the connection? (and, I mean, we HAVE to punish people right? In the most harsh way we have? To start treating them almost as badly as we treat Baptists, Presbyterians and Pentocostals?)
Well, exactly how hypocritical do we think it isn't, to formally divorce ourselves from half the people in our assembly, then shun a man forever and never allow him to break bread again, because he went and married a woman who divorced (split from) her husband? We are doing that right now, as most know. You've got people who turn their noses up at the very idea of worshipping with someone who married someone who split up her marriage, meanwhile we are actively taking part in repeatedly splitting up entire enclaves of believers. Just like doing the latter does not come to bear on our fitness to do the former.
So, not terribly cooperatively, I say that the dubious way we enact this shunning of individuals isn't a key problem, but merely a symptom of a greater sin: a failure to care, let alone love. A willingness to force divorce on assemblies. A unity fail that's been unrepentantly going on for centuries and is now just cost of doing business on the assembly line.
As to my own conscience, I was unable to split from my church. I'd been raised that it was bad to do that. Couldn't see it any other way, either. Still can't. Couldn't turn my back and walk away from a group of Christians. Tried to deal. Tried to know and be known. This was upsetting to some.
We weren't to know most things. We weren't to be known, either. They had to kick me out. I wasn't leaving any other way. And they needed me gone, because I was a different flavour of vanilla from their flavour of vanilla, and they administratively, traditionally do not abide that.
So they shun, split, divide, and excommunicate. Me, my parents, my friends. And to me, it's all the same thing. People who don't care about you kicking you out (for good) when they don't want to deal with you. Like with the other Christians in their churches. Because they don't care about them or you. Not enough to actually phone or anything.
It never was, really, about what you did or didn't do. Never. It's about if you're the same. If you fit. If you're difficult to deal with for any reason. If you are difficult or embarrassing or awkward or different, they will claim to speak for God, so as to claim the right to 'delete' you all from their church's Contacts List. Make you all unpersons. Like so very many of us. Like the vast majority of the Church who are alive today, actually.
The Meaning of the Word "Discipline"
Another quibble: we wrongly use the word "discipline" about children and church stuff. Why do we do that? Now, obviously we didn't get the word "discipline" from the King James. What we do isn't called that in there. What we do isn't even in there to begin with.
As teachers, we are taught that we can certainly come up with what we call "classroom management strategies," which is educatorese for "control/keeping order." But we can't "discipline" children who have no self-control. Because the dictionary tells us that discipline is a personal attribute that is possessed by, rather than done to, people. So, if you are a disciplined person, this means you have self-control. If people decide you need to be punished (which is what our churches are really doing), this is evidence that:
As teachers, we are taught that we can certainly come up with what we call "classroom management strategies," which is educatorese for "control/keeping order." But we can't "discipline" children who have no self-control. Because the dictionary tells us that discipline is a personal attribute that is possessed by, rather than done to, people. So, if you are a disciplined person, this means you have self-control. If people decide you need to be punished (which is what our churches are really doing), this is evidence that:
a) they feel you have insufficient discipline to keep yourself on the rails,
b) they believe that depriving you of their company is the nastiest thing they can do to punish you, and which requires them to do, essentially, nothing whatsoever, ever again. Just ignore the problem and pretend it never existed. And while you're at it, the person too.
So, if I say "parental discipline" or "teacher discipline" or "church discipline" ("assembly discipline") the word is supposed to be talking about if the parents, teachers or churches have any self-control. But we don't use it that way. What we're doing with that word is sneakily avoiding the word "punishment."
When I say "discipline" in the way we tend to, I'm definitely, when talking about churches, avoiding the word "revenge." I'm avoiding the word "bigotry." And "intolerance." I'm avoiding the words "conquering" and "dominating." I'm avoiding words like "culling the herd," and "weeding out diversity." I'm avoiding words like "putting everyone again under bondage, and enforcing the following of traditions of men." Also "making yourself Grand Wizard." I'm saying "discipline" and "oversight" and "assembly action" instead of those terms.
That's why I might use the word "discipline" in another way than it is meant to be used. To avoid really admitting what is being done. Punishing. Anyone and anything we don't like. Especially diversity. Even more so, any wanting to know, any looking into what's really going on. Any trying to know things. Any trying to be known, when one might be different.
Relationship
So, say you don't really love someone. Not enough for that love to change your behaviour toward the person in such a way that he or she could feel it, anyway. Not enough that he or she could feel something different than if they were dealing with the police. (I was pulled over for speeding last week. In that one interaction, the officer showed more warmth and kindness in his redirection of my tardiness-induced misbehaviour than I ever experienced at my church. Ever.)
But let's say that, even though you don't know this person, you still want the right to, as a group, punish them. Well, punishment without relationship isn't punishment. It's an attack. It's abuse. When that police officer spoke to me in my window, I could feel his relationship to our community. I could feel how he goes around doing nothing but making my life safer.
If I am a parent or teacher, and a child is my child/student and I punish them in any way (corporal, allowance withholding, grounding, timeout, detentions), the relationship tends to justify the act. If a stranger decides to hit me, take my money, and/or confine me to a room, this is an altogether more sinister act. Imagine if I went up to a random fifteen year old girl on the street, who doesn't even attend my school, and told her that she has to come into a room with me and stay there for an hour, because she has a detention? That would be the creepiest things ever. Because there's no relationship to work as the foundation to, and justification for it.
My argument is that, if a church doesn't know you, hasn't connected with you, taught you, helped you, shown it has your best interests at heart and is qualified to help you, hasn't built a relationship, then they can't punish you without being that creepy guy. Can't do it without it being abuse. And, ultimately, can't make you feel the loss of connection to them like you do if that person HAS a connection to you to begin with. There is no foundation, no pretext for suddenly seeking to punish you.
When I was punished by being kicked out of my church, I did not suffer the loss of relationship. No relationship had been built. Relating had been avoided. So instead I lost the ability to mentally and emotionally identify myself with my birth culture. The vast majority of individual people I might have had some tiny connection to in there had largely either been kicked out, or in a few cases had grown up to become psychojudgybeasts themselves, and were people who wanted me gone. I was tempting them to doubt/think/feel things. Just by being myself. And that had to stop.
Ultimately, what happened was I gained the ability to see clearly and lost the ability to ignore what had always been true, and which I had always felt and known, deep down. It was simple: they didn't care. They wanted me gone. They would use any excuse. So they could "have lovely meetings" and claim to be right and "unified" in some purely theoretical way. No matter how many Christians they had to send away into "la la la I can't hear you land" to maintain any ability to claim all that.
How Do You Do Collectively "Discipline" When You Aren't A Unified Collective and You Have No Discipline?
Years ago I was speaking with a recently ex-Brethren person who pointed out things I'd never considered before at that point. Made me think. Unlike the people who hadn't left. Stuff like "Who says Matthew 18:20 is talking about Sunday morning worship?" and "Who says that 1 Corinthians 5 is talking about a formal announcement made by an assembly claiming to be the one that speaks for God in that area?"
He explained that, if for example someone was a child molester (this is not the example he used), people would naturally start not inviting him to their kids' birthday parties, or giving references to work at playgrounds and so on. The child molester would find himself on the outside. Withdrawn from.
Ironically, seven years before I was kicked out for supposedly corrupting the morals of someone, this ex-Brethren guy was explaining why he personally had nothing to do with that exact same person, as he claimed that person possessed corrupted morals. Among other things, because of his unemployed, daily hash-smoking, and his mistreatment of his young wife. Because we knew this guy. That is the example he used. That guy.
This ex-Brethren guy then described the whole injunction to "put out from among yourselves that wicked person" as something that the various members of the Christian community would all start doing individually., rather than something a few higher-ups would enforce on everyone else.
He explained that, if for example someone was a child molester (this is not the example he used), people would naturally start not inviting him to their kids' birthday parties, or giving references to work at playgrounds and so on. The child molester would find himself on the outside. Withdrawn from.
Ironically, seven years before I was kicked out for supposedly corrupting the morals of someone, this ex-Brethren guy was explaining why he personally had nothing to do with that exact same person, as he claimed that person possessed corrupted morals. Among other things, because of his unemployed, daily hash-smoking, and his mistreatment of his young wife. Because we knew this guy. That is the example he used. That guy.
This ex-Brethren guy then described the whole injunction to "put out from among yourselves that wicked person" as something that the various members of the Christian community would all start doing individually., rather than something a few higher-ups would enforce on everyone else.
I don't know what I think of that guy's interpretation. Very contrary to how I was raised, and yet I don't find a bulletproof case for only reading 1 Cor how I was taught to. (I liked this guy when we spoke like that. Not when he told people he thought I "struggled with gay tendencies.")
I know something is messed up: if I were to annoy one group of Christians in the city of Philadelphia (Philly, Pennsylvania, not the one in Turkey/the bible), I could then just go to other groups instead. Because they're not unified. That's the level of "Christian unity" that is practically possible to us, nowadays. That makes this "official, announcement of collective Christian shunning" thing rather dubious. Because it never happens. It's not the local church. It's always just these little groups deciding to shun or not, while the majority of the Christians in the area don't know the person and know nothing about it, and are off in their own churches.
Either the verse doesn't mean that Christians should obey it as a collective and is instead intended to be done by individual people, or else we simply have to admit that if it is talking about a "Christians in the whole city of Philadelphia" thing, then we really just can't do that anymore, nowadays. Because we Christians in a given city don't speak with one another, let alone act as a unit, ever.
I know something is messed up: if I were to annoy one group of Christians in the city of Philadelphia (Philly, Pennsylvania, not the one in Turkey/the bible), I could then just go to other groups instead. Because they're not unified. That's the level of "Christian unity" that is practically possible to us, nowadays. That makes this "official, announcement of collective Christian shunning" thing rather dubious. Because it never happens. It's not the local church. It's always just these little groups deciding to shun or not, while the majority of the Christians in the area don't know the person and know nothing about it, and are off in their own churches.
Either the verse doesn't mean that Christians should obey it as a collective and is instead intended to be done by individual people, or else we simply have to admit that if it is talking about a "Christians in the whole city of Philadelphia" thing, then we really just can't do that anymore, nowadays. Because we Christians in a given city don't speak with one another, let alone act as a unit, ever.
In concrete terms: If a Presbyterian church in Philadelphia decided that George had stolen money from the collection plate one too many times, and sent an announcement to the "Saints who are in Philadelphia" collectively (and if some mechanism for contacting all the Christians in Philadelphia even existed in this shattered time, DESPITE our nearly omnipotent powers of telecommunication) telling them to put George out from among themselves, this wouldn't work. At all.
Either the group desirous of punishing George would be ignored by the other groups, who'd not want to get involved (as George isn't a Baptist/Pentecostal/Methodist, and therefore not of the body, and we "have no need of" him to begin with) or worse yet, the different churches might want to meet up, discuss the matter, and decide what the standard and policy is now going to be when deciding for everyone to officially, collectively shun someone or not.
Now clearly, this latter course of action would defeat the whole purpose of us having (sinfully, in my opinion) divided and remaining divided, to begin with. All of the Christians in Philly working together? Very, very much against the grain. Not traditional or orthodox at all.
If the majority of the Christians in Philadelphia had to agree as to George's fate, no agreement would likely ever be reached, given how we roll nowadays. So we end up with a situation in which one group decides (and where is this in scripture?) that they are responsible for/own/rule George and his fate, and they decide. Then they don't even inform the other groups, opting to "tell it not in Gath," just as if the Pentecostals, Presbyterians and Baptists were enemies/Philistines.
Either the group desirous of punishing George would be ignored by the other groups, who'd not want to get involved (as George isn't a Baptist/Pentecostal/Methodist, and therefore not of the body, and we "have no need of" him to begin with) or worse yet, the different churches might want to meet up, discuss the matter, and decide what the standard and policy is now going to be when deciding for everyone to officially, collectively shun someone or not.
Now clearly, this latter course of action would defeat the whole purpose of us having (sinfully, in my opinion) divided and remaining divided, to begin with. All of the Christians in Philly working together? Very, very much against the grain. Not traditional or orthodox at all.
If the majority of the Christians in Philadelphia had to agree as to George's fate, no agreement would likely ever be reached, given how we roll nowadays. So we end up with a situation in which one group decides (and where is this in scripture?) that they are responsible for/own/rule George and his fate, and they decide. Then they don't even inform the other groups, opting to "tell it not in Gath," just as if the Pentecostals, Presbyterians and Baptists were enemies/Philistines.
More Concrete Terms
In the 2002 local division, I have relatives who stayed/left because of it. They kicked out/were kicked out by, the majority of the folks in the area. For saying they did not support the kicking out/leaving/staying of a guy.
Now, what they did was they switched Sunday morning addresses. And my relatives' little group met as usual, claiming to have "stayed" and that they had in fact kicked out the ones who had in turn announced that my relatives had, conversely, been the ones who were really kicked out. And everyone said it was all Very Simple. ("Clear," too.)
And then at my relatives' place, there was a person who was being a jerk. This person was sowing discord, in that mini-assembly. Jamming up the forward momentum of that assembly line. Jockeying for power and status and importance (such as can be had in such a tiny group.) Fighting. Gossipping. Petulance. High school drama enacted among senior citizens. I heard about it, and I said "If you kick this person out, within only a couple years of your being kicked out yourself, that's going to be extremely telling. It will show that you've learned nothing, and it pretty much scuppers any hope you might have had of God blessing your staying/leaving."
Of course they kicked this person out anyway. Said that they "had no other choice." I've heard that assembly line before. (I said they had no other coping mechanism). And my relatives said that they themselves certainly had never been kicked out of anywhere. No, they had chosen to leave/stay, while the others at the original street address had left/stayed. So they kicked out this person, and his/her spouse also.
So this person began doing Sunday morning at a third street address. And decided in turn that s/he and his/her spouse had "stayed," and had kicked out everyone else. Everyone else in the whole world. Brethren style. "You don't agree with us? Fine. We will punish you as hard as we know how. We will treat you like we treat Presbyterians. Take that!"
So this person began doing Sunday morning at a third street address. And decided in turn that s/he and his/her spouse had "stayed," and had kicked out everyone else. Everyone else in the whole world. Brethren style. "You don't agree with us? Fine. We will punish you as hard as we know how. We will treat you like we treat Presbyterians. Take that!"
Now, the argument was not a simple one about "not submitting to assembly decisions/authority." In fact, the very people punishing this couple had stayed/been kicked out for precisely the same charge, only a couple of years previous.
The charge that got them treated like Baptists/Free Methodists:
"Not submitting to the 'assembly decision' to kick out people for not supporting the 'assembly decision' to kick out a guy for not supporting the 'assembly decision' to kick out another guy who wanted some other guy kicked out."
The charge that got them treated like Baptists/Free Methodists:
"Not submitting to the 'assembly decision' to kick out people for not supporting the 'assembly decision' to kick out a guy for not supporting the 'assembly decision' to kick out another guy who wanted some other guy kicked out."
To me, this is a huge Satanic feedback loop of sin, a spiral of "Just following orders/tradition" and needlessly, shamefully dividing everyone up. How simple-minded are we? How unable to learn from some extremely recent history? How determined to endlessly repeat our past mistakes? How many messy ecclesiastical divorces, while still claiming to be an expression of the Unity of the Church?
With me personally, as to my Presbyterian's-place punishment, my charge was, like most charges, completely different depending upon who you asked. "The assembly" put me out for supposedly "attempting to corrupt the morals of" an unemployed daily hash user who terrorized his wife. By letting him see a parody of the church's outreach pamphlet.
I was notified of this "assembly decision" by registered letter. I had to sign for it so they could prove I got it in case I planned to pretend I'd never seen it. Because they feared I would show a characteristic refusal to discuss the negative, to meet conflict head on, or be honest.
So the "assembly decision" had been made. But the actual people of the actual assembly, when spoken to, were completely unaware of what had happened. I checked. They didn't know what I'd done, nor did they know what the charge was. They had no idea what they'd "decided" until I told them, and then they didn't believe me. Some were under the impression that I'd been making porn. So the "assembly decision" had been made, whatever it was regarding. They just knew that they had to support it, whatever it was, or they'd be kicked out too. That's how they roll.
But let's be a bit more simple: that person causing drama in my relatives' assembly. That couple, eventually. What if each person in the congregation "withdrew" from that person? Individually. One by one, as they noticed the problem. What if eventually, the people in whose house the church met simply said "We're not going to pretend to wield the divine power to actually somehow 'put you away from The Lord's Table' or anything, but please don't come here anymore? We're tired of this. Please go away. You're messing everything up. We can't deal with you."
I think they'd be in for a lot less divine judgment for a statement like that. I think there'd be a lot less repentance required on the part of the tiny, divided subset of the local Christian community. And if said trouble-makers went to a different church group, they couldn't claim clearcut administrative abuse anymore. They could just say no one wanted them. That Christians had a problem with them. All this could be done without pretending to Spank for God. All without pretending to somehow "defend" the Lord's Table, Supper, Name, Day or any of his other attributes, which do not, to my knowledge, need defending, polishing, protection or purifying.
In Summation
Your questions:
1. Should sin be dealt with collectively? Individuals who know the offending person should deal. Not power figures. People who know the person, first. "Who knows George? Okay, well could you talk to him, then, if you haven't already?" In any Christian assembly, the offending person SHOULD be known, if there is any love stuff going on, any attempt to follow scripture.
If "the group" speaks at all, it should never pretend to speak for God the Father. It should never pretend to speak for The Lord's Table (tables don't speak). It should never pretend to speak as "The Only Correct Representation Of Christian Unity and Purity and White Pride In This Community." If it does, it is guilty of worse things than the person it presumes to judge.
I think shunning (individual, or in our tiny subgroups) should be what J.N. Darby said. It should be presented not as a strategy or mechanism for dealing, but rather as a failure to deal, an inability to deal. How dare we fail at love stuff and then say it is our sad duty to judge people for what we see as "light" stuff? Correctness? How correct can our judging action be seen to be, exactly, when it flows out of a lack of love action? Yet in the Christian groups I am familiar with, shunning is often pretty much the first and only step. And no one who claims to know or understand, let alone care about, the person in line for shunning, is ever allowed to be involved at all.
2. Who determines if/when there has been repentance? Someone who knows the person and cares. If there's no one like that, no one can. If you have no relationship with the person in question, how could you presume to know enough to judge them? Repentance or otherwise? If you hang out with them, you will likely get to know them. If you find they're doing something you have a problem with, you tell them you have a problem with it/them. And withdraw from them at least a bit. Keeping them in mind, if you care at all. These things naturally, organically take care of themselves. If there's any natural, human connection. (I'm not demanding some Christian standard of love. Just saying that if even a natural, human connection has not been formed, then you can't deal) All without you pretending to speak for God the Father.
3. Who and what is worthy of shunning? You decide who you will talk to, deal with, treat as a Christian, discuss the bible with, and gather with on Sunday morning. You do. There is no membership list rulebook. And if you get it wrong (either by not recognizing a Christian, or by giving tacit approval to some very dubious behaviour by someone who claims to be a Christian) then you've screwed up and there are consequences. For just you, though. Unless you claim to be speaking for a group or something as high-school as that.
This pretense that our group is The Head of the Church has got to stop. Just withdraw from troubling people. As individuals. As a group of individuals. Not as anything more grandiose than that. Don't make it about power and control and dominance.
In Summation
Your questions:
1. Should sin be dealt with collectively? Individuals who know the offending person should deal. Not power figures. People who know the person, first. "Who knows George? Okay, well could you talk to him, then, if you haven't already?" In any Christian assembly, the offending person SHOULD be known, if there is any love stuff going on, any attempt to follow scripture.
If "the group" speaks at all, it should never pretend to speak for God the Father. It should never pretend to speak for The Lord's Table (tables don't speak). It should never pretend to speak as "The Only Correct Representation Of Christian Unity and Purity and White Pride In This Community." If it does, it is guilty of worse things than the person it presumes to judge.
I think shunning (individual, or in our tiny subgroups) should be what J.N. Darby said. It should be presented not as a strategy or mechanism for dealing, but rather as a failure to deal, an inability to deal. How dare we fail at love stuff and then say it is our sad duty to judge people for what we see as "light" stuff? Correctness? How correct can our judging action be seen to be, exactly, when it flows out of a lack of love action? Yet in the Christian groups I am familiar with, shunning is often pretty much the first and only step. And no one who claims to know or understand, let alone care about, the person in line for shunning, is ever allowed to be involved at all.
2. Who determines if/when there has been repentance? Someone who knows the person and cares. If there's no one like that, no one can. If you have no relationship with the person in question, how could you presume to know enough to judge them? Repentance or otherwise? If you hang out with them, you will likely get to know them. If you find they're doing something you have a problem with, you tell them you have a problem with it/them. And withdraw from them at least a bit. Keeping them in mind, if you care at all. These things naturally, organically take care of themselves. If there's any natural, human connection. (I'm not demanding some Christian standard of love. Just saying that if even a natural, human connection has not been formed, then you can't deal) All without you pretending to speak for God the Father.
3. Who and what is worthy of shunning? You decide who you will talk to, deal with, treat as a Christian, discuss the bible with, and gather with on Sunday morning. You do. There is no membership list rulebook. And if you get it wrong (either by not recognizing a Christian, or by giving tacit approval to some very dubious behaviour by someone who claims to be a Christian) then you've screwed up and there are consequences. For just you, though. Unless you claim to be speaking for a group or something as high-school as that.
This pretense that our group is The Head of the Church has got to stop. Just withdraw from troubling people. As individuals. As a group of individuals. Not as anything more grandiose than that. Don't make it about power and control and dominance.
I think this would work for unrepentant granny murderers too.
"We don't want to break bread/socialize with you. Go elsewhere in the Church at large."
That would be more honest. I think it's what's really happening. But all this jibber jabber. All this pious talk to make it sound like we're wielding the very sword of Blind Justice herself. Blindly. Unlovingly. Unfeelingly.
Seriously. It's about relationship. If you don't have any, and haven't tried to get any, if you absolutely suck at understanding and connecting to other human beings, how like Jesus are you, and how qualified to act and speak for his interests are you, exactly? How qualified to feed, let alone judge, his sheep?
"We don't want to break bread/socialize with you. Go elsewhere in the Church at large."
That would be more honest. I think it's what's really happening. But all this jibber jabber. All this pious talk to make it sound like we're wielding the very sword of Blind Justice herself. Blindly. Unlovingly. Unfeelingly.
Seriously. It's about relationship. If you don't have any, and haven't tried to get any, if you absolutely suck at understanding and connecting to other human beings, how like Jesus are you, and how qualified to act and speak for his interests are you, exactly? How qualified to feed, let alone judge, his sheep?
I think the thing to do is work with people you can work with, and if you can't work with them (because you don't know them), don't. And when you fail to connect to someone, I think you should see it as a failure.
I think this is, as you say, Willow Sage, a huge topic. And these are just some thoughts dashed off during my prep period at work when I should be crushing the hopes and dreams of adolescents brutally underfoot. (or marking their crappy, crappy writing).
I think this is, as you say, Willow Sage, a huge topic. And these are just some thoughts dashed off during my prep period at work when I should be crushing the hopes and dreams of adolescents brutally underfoot. (or marking their crappy, crappy writing).
Sincerely yours,
...that Wikkid Person
Certified Wikked since 1998
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