What does it mean to be a Mennonite Agency Faithful to its Constituency

              ·~MENNONITE BOARD OF MISSIONS AND· CHARITIES
memo to
from
date
subiect
To Whom It May Concern
John H. Yoder, Associate Consultant
May 14, 1969
What does . it mean to be a Mennonite
Agency faithful to its constituency?
BOX 370 • ELKHART, INOIANA 46514
The experience of all those who have been attempting to carry on serious
communication about the mission of the church, within the last generation
in Mennonite agencies, has been marked by a profusion of complaints that
these agencies are not representative or are "leading the church" in · some
wrong direction. This paper suggests that these complaints are very worthy
of analysis, even if they are sollletimes axgued in unworthy ways.
The analysis should begin by identifying a certain confusion of categories
and criteria. For some, a church agency is responsible to represent ~
constituency, as a government agency is responsible to discharge a mandate
from its electors. Such a perspective leads one to the conclusion that
the administrators and missionaries in Mennonite church agencies are not
fully faithful, since they find ·.themselves taking ·positions distinct · from
those . of . the .bulk of the constituency congregations; · toward the urban . life
style, toward social concerns, toward other Christian groups. The reprimand
for failing to be : "representative of the constituency," although sometimes
stated in .too sharp a form; ·has often not been fundamentally unfair.
· .The other approach is to , argue · openly that church agencies should · get
direction rrom some other perspective than . that ·of : the present'·;C:onsensus
of the . cons ti tuenc::y • . '.This may be appealed to because the ·cons titUency
speaks with many voices, or because one is convinced ··that some other
standard is more proper. This other standard may be borrowed from some
other Christian tradition such as· conservative evangelicalism or mainstream
American protestantism, ·and mixed with the Mennonite tradition in the
proportions with which a given individual can feel ·at home. Or it may be
given still more authority; instead of seeking a synthesd:s between the
borrowed standards and the constituency tradftions, the borrowed standards
may be given such authority. :1:hat 1:hey stand in judgment .upon the tradition.
In .this case the agency administrator or workermay believe that the
constituency should support him because the position he takes is right,
but he recognizes no obligation to convince the con·stituency of the rightne$s
of . .h is position since he is emotionally committed to that other standard.
Or . . ~his "other standard" may be the individu·a1' s own adjustment to con-temporary
society, which is given symbolic ·expression in ·the word, ·"relevance."
Anything is then "irre:levant" which does not :fit into contemporary social
tastes. Or this same quality of commitment ·may be attached to some doctrinal
tradition other than one's own, such as conserva tiv-? evangelicalism or some
current style in ecumenical or liberal theology.
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What do Mennonite agencies claim to be governed by? The Constituency?
The Gospel? The Bible? The Anabaptist vision? The needs of the world?
These are not all the same, as some define them. For a time, it was
possible for American Mennonites to postpone the reckoning on this question
which had to come some day. It had to come some day because these various
kinds of borrowing from and of commitment to other theological traditions
were not ultimately compatible with each other, or with the constituency
which was being called upon to support them. In most other Christian
movements, which also have this identity problem~ the reckoning has had to
take one or both of two possible forms. One form is the loosening up of the
peculiar identity to the benefit of a kind of tolerant pluralism in which
the various views are permitted to exist side by side and the identity of
the denomination makes no more claims to be a theological unity. The
understanding is rather maintained that many views may persist side by side,
as long as they serve a population with something of the same cultural
background, and support the same mediating institutions.
The other alternativ.e, if matters of strict theological identity are
important enough to those involved, is a division, whereby a group of
persons committed either to one of the newly borrowed theological positions
or to a revitalization of the old tradition, is able to take with it a
segment of the constituency, and to bring off the creation of a new body
which has, for a generation at least, a new identity clarified by the
experience of division.
Mennonites were spared this day of reckoning through the experiences of
the 1940's, which brought about two phenomena in the Mennonite experience
which are not typical of such devolving social groups. One aspect was the
experience of conscientious objection and civilian public service, which
restored to Mennonitism a sense of identity distinct not only from the
world but from other church traditions, an identity which was reinforced
by the experience of standing up and suffering for it. Conscientious
objection was by no means the heart of the living faith of Mennonite
communities. Nor did there exist any very extensive theological undergirding
which would enable such a position to be argued ecumenically or taught
theologically. Nonetheless there remained enough strength on the a:>
identity of American and Canadian Mennonites that the crisis of full
acculturation could be pushed off by a fraction of a generation.
The other new event was the "Rediscovery of the Anabaptist Vision."
With this label we usually designate the following combination of
circumstances : .
1. The progress of historical studies of 16th century Anabaptism
as carried on by Mennonite scholars. Much of this was not
brand new scholarship, as much of the original research had
been done in the latter half of the preceeding century by
non-Mennonite scholars and in the first third of the present
century by European Mennonites. What happened between 1930
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and 1945 was the translation and assimilation of this historical
research by c. Henry Smith, John Horsch and Haro.ld Bender,
culminatin9 in the early 1940's in the consensus that there
was such a thing as an "Anabaptist Vision" which was both
historically rooted and theologically respectable.
2. A generation of young Mennonites, pulled away from h~me _ into
Civilian Public Service, forced to focus attention upon
their inherited idectity as never before; were able to grasp
this rediscovered histo~ical vision as somehow connected ~ith
the faith of their own fathers, and thereby could resist , ~he
temptation to wonder away into mainstream .protestantism ,pr
into one of the other more cultured peace churches or : pe~ce
movements.
3. Responding to the combined shock of the acculturation crisis
and the war, there came the institutional development of
Mennonite relief and service agencies, :followed a:fter the
war by rapid growth as well in missionary and educational
agencies, so that ·the personal sel:f discovery and the
historical rediscovery correlated with a sense o:f ins~itu­tional
movement· and maturation.
The way:· in which these experiences delayed the . impact o:f the accul tura ~ion
crisis has hidden for a generation o:f Mennonites the :facts .of their
sociological life. The sense of being "a people apart" could survive without
sociological self-criticism. These facts are not coming . to. the sμrface in
a way which is widely felt .in the :form of source of dismay and .questioning.
The first reaction in the fact of this .dismay is to :feel that .:fr . so.me .kind
of study were done or some kind of conference were ·held or some: new ?ffice
created, it would be possible to "return to normal"; -- namely, , .to a
situation where most Mennonites, and all of them who are .concerned ;about
operating church agencies, would be basically agreed about who they are
and widely supported by. their constituency.
It is the lesson o:f a sober· x:eading of Mennonite history .that there is no
such "norm.al" situation to return to. · The basic cultural .identity of
Mennonitism as itmigrated :into North America and .ac;ross the midwest was
that of an ethnic enclave, kept a:live by linguistic and cultural peculiarities,
'and by limiting its contacts with the wider world and·:the wider church. . .
Immigrating American Mennonites maintained their .ethnic identity just as
did most of ·.the other cultural groups who entered the American continent;
-- thanks · to the relative looseness .of · the general social structure, ·
which enabled any 'blood-bound group · to live largely for :itself during the
periods be.fore the development of a unifying national culture-and language.
This identity was strong enough not to feel unsure of itsel:f as numerous
additions we~e made in the .form of elements from the surrounding culture
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and church practice, which were grafted into Mennonite practice with more
or less debate: -- Sunday schools, evangelism, the church college,
conference organization, etc. Once each of those grafts had "taJcen;" it
seemed to the next generation to be a taken-for-granted part of a self-evident
whole.
But then when in the middle of the present century the number of grat'.ts
had become so great, and the ethnic distinctiveness had become so slight
that the old pure root stock could hardly be found, it was suddenly visible
that the various grafts or borrowings were not necessarily compatible with
one another. The borrowings from conservative evangelicalism had developed
into confidence in the authority of a particular protestant-orthodox
doctrinal style and the centrality of a certain kind of religious experience.
The church colleges had opened the door to a particular concept of the
independence of the several academic disciplines. The leaders of church
conference and board structures developed a preoccupation with mediating
any debates rather than permitting them to issue in divisiveness, and
with smoothing out and centralizing machinery. Thus each segment of the
institutional life of the denomination has become a sub-culture of its
own, deriving a major portion of its identity from one particular set of
borrowings from American protestantism, which didn't necessarily fit
together with all the others. The various segments are held together by
their outward loyalty to the same Mennonite population. Yet this common
loyalty no longer gives a particular spiritual character to the total
brotherhood. It is only natural that each segment of the denomination
should believe that in this crisis of identity the only hope for survival
is in the priority of its own specific emphasis. The church agency
moderators call for moderation and for a type of administrative structure
which can stand administrative tension without breaking. The proponents
of the borrowings from evangelicalism call for a renewed commitment to
basics. The outreach agencies call for a redefinition of the mission of
the brotherhood. Those who are the least conscious of their borrowings,
the American patriots, call for an end to all the new ideas. Each group,
taking for granted the priority of its ovm receipe for renewal, and
assuming that its own borrowing was fruitfully and fully merged with the
original anabaptist-Mennonite identity, can hardly avoid accusing the
proponents of other views of either limited intelligence or lack of good
faith, as "they" continue to tail to see the centrality of the solution
which seems so sel1' evident to "us." Now in principle, this same problem
existed ten or even thirty years ago, but the common cultural and ethnic
experience was so strong that the separate strands never came completely
apart. Now the plurality of cultural experiences has grown to the point
where such a reconciliation by an appeal to a common cultural heritage and
denominational brotherhood is no longer taken for granted and perhaps no
longer even possible. Yet we go on assuming that "the brotherhood" is a
unity, that all the various borrowings :from the various mainstreams are all
compatible with proper theology and with each other, and that therefore it
is a fruitful thing to do to keep all the people and all the ideas
together.
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Now what would happen to our ·picture of things if we stopped making this
assumption, which certainly has not been . proven either logically or
theologically, that all po~sible borrowings . are reconcilable and that
the root stock is heal thy and strong enough to carry them all? \·Jha t if
the various positions are so far apart that there isno conceivable way that
they can be "moderated" within one structure? Is it still a virtuous thing
for the moderator . type of person to keep trying to hold them all together
at the cost of great efforts in restructural studies .and comprises which
will satisfy no one? \\!hat i:f radical commitment to "involvement in the
social crises of our time" sho~ld be really incompatible with a11 :the value
commitments with rural conservative Mennonite society; is it really a worthy
concern for the activist urban pastor to wear himself out ·trying to be relevant
without being too offensive to the country cousin? What i:f ·administering
Mennonite hospitals or colleges should be fundamentally inconsistent with
radical discipleship because discipleship demands renunciation of power?
What i:f the cultural task of the midwestern church college should be
fundamentally incompatible with the critical attitude of the believers'
church toward culture? If it is the case that the averageMennonite con-gregation
and the average person who has grown up into membership therein
have an understanding that the meaning o:f the Christian faith which is
structurally incapable of being communicated to someone who is not born
into it, is there any real utility to attempting to pump missionary vitality
.into such persons or groups by means of workshops and study processes, when
the basic reality of their faith is ·not missionary in character? Is there
any special mer;t in trying to prove that we can get closer to doing all of
these impossible things together than somebody else could? Or would there
be a point at which it would .be most proper . to recognize that some · tensions
are impossible to resolve and · that there is no special virture in continuing
to try. to do the impossible?
Let it not be thought that this is a problem v1hich every denomination ·has
with equal seriousness at a certain point in "sect cycle." It will not
happen in the same way to groups like the conservative Christian Reformed
or Missouri Synod, Lutherans who have atheology ·:for·a community which is
not .a church .of believers. It will not happen to ·groups like pentecostals
whose '..distinctive theological position .is not one which makes a deep
. difference for . congregational structure and process. It will not happen
to. t!le community chwrches and Bible churches whose ethical position is very
eclectic and middle of the road. It is a unique problem .for Mennonites
because of a strong cultural apartness (German rural), a ·powerful tradition
·of separate self preservation, (by definition, the oldest sectari an group in
protestantism), ·linked with a strong theological rationale for a distinct
. pos :f:tion (the "renewal o:f the anabaptis t ·vis ion").
What would happen if we admitted that it is no longer a possible test or
source of strategy to say .that whatever we do must be integrated into the
root stock of Mennonite .population? What if we assumed frankly that any
cause around which it is worthwhile to gather the renewed commitment of
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Christians in our age is not one which all who are Mennonites by birth
would be willing to accept? What i£ we projected a vision for the immediate
future· without making the claim that it is that to which our Mennonite
heritage commits us?
This is, in a sense, what Harold s. Bender was trying to do when he raised
the flag of "Anabaptist Vision" over the Mennonite ship of state. The
anabaptist vision was really very different from Mennonite reality, put he
hoped to be able to use the appeal to the forefathers as a way to commend
this vision to his constituency. By now it is possible to discern some of
the limits of that strategy.
a. To the extent to which H. s. Bender was successful in telling
Mennonites that the Anabaptists were their forefathers, this had
as much the effect of diluting Anabaptism as it did of providing
an entering wedge for renewal. Sanford Shetler appeals to the
Anabaptists as the pioneers of his attitude toward church and
state; Norman Kraus appeals to the Anabaptists as forerunners
of a more radical vision of social change than other protestants
have accepted. Myron Augsburger appeals to the Anabaptists as the
first representatives of the merger of evangelical piety and
discleship ethics which he advocates for today; J. D. Graber
appeals to the Anabaptists as the pioneers of the modern
missionary idea; Goshen College appeals to the Anabaptists
as the first representatives of a vision of culture for service,
Goshen seminary is established to propagate Anabaptism through
a presbyterian pattern of ministry and ministerial education.
In short, the Anabaptist label has been accepted, but it has
become a source of self-justification and a slogan for promotion
of what we were going to do anyway, rather than being a source
of standards, judgment and renewal. Instead of being effective
because it is different from what Mennonites currently are or
believe in, it has been accepted as a handy label with which to
justify what we were and were going to do for other reasons.
b. A further unintended implication of directing the anabaptist
message to Mennonites was that this same amount of effort was
not invested in a kind of testimony which would have reached
Methodists or Catholics, Adventists or Marxists, who would have
in principle just as much reason to be expected to be open to
the appeal of this vision.
c. Still another effect of the linkage between the anabaptist
vision and Mennonite institutions is the "rejection by
association" which can result. Individuals who have had
bad experiences with Mennonite communities or agencies or
administrators may, by virtue of the above association,
believe that it is the vision which they must reject. The
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biblical orientation o:f anabaptism may be rejected by a
contemporary young Mennonite because o:f . the cultural ·
obscurantism with which Mennonites he has . known have used
the Bible. The concept o:f congregational :decision-making
and community moral ·witness may be rejected because of bad
experiences with gossip or · ostracism or ·community pressure
tactics in congregational experience. The vision o:f the
simple life may be rejected because 0£ tlw :frustrations of
having been the child o:f a minister or missionary whose
congregation exploited his services while other members lived
com£ortably • . The vision or nonresistance and the way or : the
cross may be rejected because o:f the way some Mennonite young
men behave unworthi·ly in 1-W service or the way some institutional
leaders use power -plays against one another • . The vision o:f the
Believers' Church :may be rejected because the practice· of baptism
in Mennonite .churches is quasi-automatic. In many such cases,
which could be documented abundantly :from the experience--(e.g.)
o:f seminary graduates, because it is the vision which is
explicitly proclaimed, it is the visioowhich is rejectedj · ·even
though the bad experiences have been not with the vision but
with practices which would stand condemned by the vision ; ·
d • . When points (b) and (c) above are seen ··together;· it :further :·
:follows that a questionable stewardship ·o:f· creativity and
initiative is involved ·in attempting -to commend an anabaptist
idealism to a population o:f people who have heard the most about ·
it in the past. I:f one were·attemptirig .to give some contagious
disease to a maximum ·number o:f persons, one would not select as
targets a population·: which : had ·already been vaccinated. Yet ·
this is in effect what is done -when a Mennonite population, that
is to .say .a selected ·group:.0£ persons who have already been
subjected ·to ·a very mild case o:f discipleship, and have thereby
developed resistance to anything more, are ·chosen as the
privileged target audience ·:for an ·e:f:fort: -to communicate the ·anabaptist
vision.o ·. The ··continuing. .c hanneling o:f· ..t his: particular ·vision 'into·
the tninds ' o:f this. particular ·target populationt · with the hope ·~hat
it. will provide .a new identity. ·to the ·same, thereby results : in a
disfunctional applicationo:f :the · anabaptist message.
It the above analysis· ·is: correct, .then the ·very· :flexibility of
this slogan, its availability to serve as a la.bel for every vision
of renewal rather than discriminating among them, makes problems
worse by postponing serious . dealing with them.· Everyone could
think there was far reaching agreement because the several parties
within the denomination all agreed, :for various reasons, to
civilian public service and overseas relie:f and to calling it
anabaptist •. This gave a deceptive impression o:f common conviction
where .it would have · been more :fruitful for the real resolution of
problems to have begun with more or earlier awareness 0£ the
depths of the di££erences.
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e. A further shortcoming of this unquestioning identification of
Anabaptist rhetoric with Mennonite sociology is the warp it
gives to the "agenda" for the thinking of Mennonites. Mennonite
sociology as it undergoes social change dictates the agenda with
which congregations, conferences, and individuals must struggle:
The introduction of the organ into worship, the relaxing of the
prescription for a specific form of devotional veiling, the
adoption of urban social-climbing life styles, the acceptance of
divorced persons are examples.
i. This forced set of priorities diverts effort, attention
and energy from issues which would be more strategic
from a biblical-anabaptist perspective.
ii. This acculturation/urbanization agenda actually prejudices
Mennonites to be on the wronq side of some issues: social
change, the need for disciplined family life, non-conformity.
iii. Being dictated by events, this agenda is uncreative.
iv. By its nature, this agenda contributes to a sense of
retreat, or "drift" or loosening-up period "leadership"
then comes to be conceived of as predominantly a sense
of timing, testing what "the churches are ready for,"
and making sure that one does not go too far: or
"too slowly." Whereas from a biblical or anabaptist
perspective leadership would call for a recovery of'
discipline, in this context the most significant ';leadership"
is that which moderates in the process of loosening up
of discipline.
For the losing party, the conservative person who has
made himself' the advocate of the discipline which is
forsaken, this contributes to a soured defeatism, with
self-realizing prophecies about where the church is
going. For the advocate of' change, the result is an
unrealistically opti!'i.dstic sense of' progress; since it
interprets as increasing "relevance" and "success" an
accommodation process which is really a loss of character
and which, when it is most successful, simply means that
Mennonites accept positions and practices which other
churches have accepted before them.
Instead of focusing upon the Word and the World and
identifying fresh issues; leadership focuses upon the
median church constituency and what it will be possible
to get them to accept.
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Thus it is not enough to say that Mennonite sociology does not always
provide a .fitt:!.::o vehicle for the anabaptist vision. At some points
it must be said it constitutes a positive handicap both to an inner
understanding of that vision and to effectiveness of witness •
.f. The above considerations have spoken to whether Mennonites can
.freely and fruit.fully ~ind '.their place as bearers of the anabaptist
vision in the modern world. This is the .Problem of the image
Mennonites have of themselves. It must also be pointed out that
many of the same handicaps have as well an external dimension;
they con.fuse the image which others have o.f Mennonites. Mennonites
are perceived through a public image which tends to accentuate the
quaintness and irrelevance o.f their convictions and practices,
however correct or relevant their ~ image may be.
This draft is not aimed at any kind o.f publication beyond agency personnel
circles. It proposes no conclusions. Any critical comment will be
appreciated.
JHY:csd
cc: InterChurch Relations Committee
Student Services Committee
Administrative Secretaries, MBMC