Quick Takes from Christians Involved in the Public Square

What is the #1 rea­son for the church to be involved in the world?

Photo by Brandi Fitzgerald

“Fol­low­ing Jesus’ Way” (Dar­rell & Sue Yeaney)

“As the only insti­tu­tion with a man­date for com­pas­sion and peace-making” (Bill Saint)

“Because Jesus was and is; we are called to fol­low him there” (Cyn­thia Holder Rich)

“From its birth to the present, the church has ALWAYS faced out, for rea­sons bib­li­cal (which is full of mod­els for how we live with oth­ers), his­tor­i­cal (it has always been most rel­e­vant and faith­ful when engaged in the world around us), evan­gel­i­cal (all of us begin as out­siders and, this side of eter­nity, none of us can escape the con­cerns and trap­pings of the world), dox­o­log­i­cal (‘pub­lic’ vs. ‘pri­vate’ is a cat­e­gory error when viewed through the lenses of wor­ship, which has a pri­mary ‘pub­lic’ in God), and the­o­log­i­cal (God is at work in the world and not only do we need to look out to see what God is doing, but our call is to par­tic­i­pate, in our own way, in that work).” (Mark Dou­glas)

“Where should the church be if not squarely in the midst of the com­mu­nity deal­ing with the mul­ti­tude of issues that have to do with mak­ing this a more just and pleas­ant place in which to live? While my con­cern for jus­tice has not been lim­ited to the min­istry within the health care arena, that place of min­istry offers a num­ber of dra­matic oppor­tu­ni­ties to wit­ness to the rel­e­vance of the pres­ence of the church.” (Tim­o­thy Little)

“I have been led to believe that God loves the world, and I have observed that the world needs all the love it can get.” (Eric Mount)

“God loves the world that is head­ing for dis­as­ter and seeks to save it. We are called to work with God for the sal­va­tion of the world.” (John Cobb)

“As a young adult who grew up in the church, I have to say… Jesus.” (Emily Mor­gan)

“To offer an alter­nate vision of jus­tice, com­pas­sion, and hope rather than that which is pro­moted through the cur­rent dom­i­nant defin­ers of mean­ing: prof­itabil­ity, nation­al­ism, per­sonal grat­i­fi­ca­tion, and short-term suc­cess. These worldly per­spec­tives will always be with us, but the church chal­lenges us to see them in light of God’s com­mit­ment to sus­tain­abil­ity over prof­itabil­ity, com­mu­nity over xeno­pho­bic nation­al­ism, defense of the com­mon good over per­sonal grat­i­fi­ca­tion, and escha­to­log­i­cal hope over short-term hori­zons of suc­cess. I see this alter­nate vision played out in the direct mis­sion pro­grams and wor­ship ser­vices (indi­vid­ual, ecu­meni­cal, and inter­faith) in which I par­tic­i­pate as pas­tor of East Lib­erty Pres­by­ter­ian Church, Pitts­burgh, Penn­syl­va­nia.” (Randy Bush)

“Our Lord and Sav­ior Jesus Christ was involved in the world. Jesus healed and fed peo­ple. He freed them from demons. He involved him­self in the trou­bled world of his hear­ers. Since Jesus is our exam­ple for liv­ing a life on earth and is a rep­re­sen­ta­tion of God for human­ity, should we not be doing what Jesus did? Jesus was not dis­tant from the peo­ple of his day. He was inti­mately involved with the grief, trou­bles, and prob­lems of his day. His fol­low­ers should be no dif­fer­ent. Jesus was bold to say in Matthew 25: 40–46 that if you are not serv­ing those who are hun­gry, naked, impris­oned, and sick, then you are not serv­ing him. In other words, Jesus is say­ing in sub­stance that if you are not involved in the world, then you are not involved in faith. Most Chris­tians limit Jesus’ man­date to a nar­rowly defined notion of ‘char­ity.’ But I believe this man­date extends to chang­ing the con­di­tions of the vul­ner­a­ble and oppressed. We can serve the impris­oned by reform­ing the prison indus­trial com­plex and chang­ing the con­di­tions that helped send them to prison in the first place. We can serve the stranger by cre­at­ing com­mu­ni­ties of fel­low­ship to make them our neigh­bors. We can serve the hun­gry by cre­at­ing food banks and help­ing to find fair waged employ­ment so they can feed them­selves. We can serve the naked by buy­ing them clothes, giv­ing them skills, and com­ing along­side them to learn their sto­ries and con­texts. The ulti­mate ser­vice to the ‘least of these’ is to make it such that they are no longer the ‘least of these.’” (Dawan Buie)

What is your favorite bib­li­cal text that speaks to the church’s pub­lic role? Non-biblical text?

Luke 4:16–21 (Dar­rell & Sue Yeaney; Cyn­thia Holder Rich; Eric Mount)
Jesus went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sab­bath day he went into the syn­a­gogue, as was his cus­tom. He stood up to read, and the scroll of the prophet Isa­iah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is writ­ten: “The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because God has anointed me to pro­claim good news to the poor. God has sent me to pro­claim free­dom for the pris­on­ers and recov­ery of sight for the blind, to set the oppressed free, to pro­claim the year of the Lord’s favor.” Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the atten­dant and sat down. The eyes of every­one in the syn­a­gogue were fas­tened on him. He began by say­ing to them, “Today this scrip­ture is ful­filled in your hearing.”

1^st Peter 2:13–17 (Bill Saint)
Be sub­ject for the Lord’s sake to every human insti­tu­tion, whether it be to the emperor as supreme, or to gov­er­nors as sent by him to pun­ish those who do wrong and to praise those who do right. For it is God’s will that by doing right you should put to silence the igno­rance of fool­ish men. Live as free peo­ple, yet with­out using your free­dom as a pre­text for evil; but live as ser­vants of God. Honor all humans. Love the broth­er­hood. Fear God. Honor the King.

Isa­iah 45 (Mark Dou­glas) - excerpted
“This is what the LORD says to his anointed, to Cyrus, whose right hand I take hold of to sub­due nations before him and to strip kings of their armor, to open doors before him so that gates will not be shut: I will go before you and will level the moun­tains; I will break down gates of bronze and cut through bars of iron… This is what the LORD says—the Holy One of Israel, and its Maker: Con­cern­ing things to come, do you ques­tion me about my chil­dren, or give me orders about the work of my hands? It is I who made the earth and cre­ated mankind on it. My own hands stretched out the heav­ens; I mar­shaled their starry hosts. I will raise up Cyrus in my right­eous­ness: I will make all his ways straight. He will rebuild my city and set my exiles free, but not for a price or reward, says the LORD Almighty.”

Micah 6:8 (Eric Mount; Tim­o­thy Lit­tle)
God has shown you, O mor­tal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.

Book of Esther (Emily Mor­gan) — excerpted
Dis­patches were sent by couri­ers to all the king’s provinces with the order to destroy, kill and anni­hi­late all the Jews—young and old, women and chil­dren… Morde­cai sent back this answer… “And who knows but that you have come to your royal posi­tion for such a time as this?” Esther sent this reply… “When this is done, I will go to the king, even though it is against the law. And if I per­ish, I perish.”

Philip­pi­ans 4:4–9 (Randy Bush)
Rejoice in the Lord always. I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gen­tle­ness be evi­dent to all. The Lord is near. Do not be anx­ious about any­thing, but in every sit­u­a­tion, by prayer and peti­tion, with thanks­giv­ing, present your requests to God. And the peace of God, which tran­scends all under­stand­ing, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, broth­ers and sis­ters, what­ever is true, what­ever is noble, what­ever is right, what­ever is pure, what­ever is lovely, what­ever is admirable—if any­thing is excel­lent or praiseworthy—think about such things. What­ever you have learned or received or heard from me, or seen in me—put it into prac­tice. And the God of peace will be with you.

Matthew 25:31–46 (Dawan Buie)
Then the King will say to those on his right, “Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inher­i­tance, the king­dom pre­pared for you since the cre­ation of the world. For I was hun­gry and you gave me some­thing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me some­thing to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.” Then the right­eous will answer him, “Lord, when did we see you hun­gry and feed you, or thirsty and give you some­thing to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or need­ing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?” The King will reply, “Truly I tell you, what­ever you did for one of the least of these broth­ers and sis­ters of mine, you did for me.” Then he will say to those on his left, “Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eter­nal fire pre­pared for the devil and his angels. For I was hun­gry and you gave me noth­ing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me noth­ing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.” They also will answer, “Lord, when did we see you hun­gry or thirsty or a stranger or need­ing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?” He will reply, “Truly I tell you, what­ever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.”

Non-biblical text?

The Light and the Glory by Peter Mar­shall (Bill Saint)

City of God by Augus­tine (Mark Dou­glas)

Believ­ing Aloud: Reflec­tions on Being Reli­gious in the Pub­lic Square by Mark Dou­glas (Mark Dou­glas)

Let­ter from a Birm­ing­ham Jail by Mar­tin Luther King Jr (Randy Bush)

God of the Oppressed by James Cone (Dawan Buie — “I don’t agree with every­thing it says but it has been the most com­pelling book for me so far”)

Desmond Tutu Preach­ing Children’s Ser­mon, Photo by St. James Church

What is one of the best exam­ples of Chris­tians being engaged in the world?

Bread for the World: Lob­by­ing effort on behalf of end­ing world hunger (Dar­rell & Sue Yeaney)

Bishop Tutu of South Africa, Desmond Tutu Peace Cen­tre (Bill Saint)

Ongo­ing Pres­by­ter­ian Dis­as­ter Assis­tance in New Orleans (Cyn­thia Holder Rich)

Global Mission’s Crit­i­cal Issues forum in Sep­tem­ber 2012 (Cyn­thia Holder Rich)

Office of Pub­lic Wit­ness, Pres­by­ter­ian Church (U.S.A.) (Cyn­thia Holder Rich)

“Too many to name!” (Mark Dou­glas)

The Civil Rights Move­ment, U.S.A. (Eric Mount)

Sup­port for the Immokalee Work­ers and the Fair Food Cam­paign (Eric Mount)

“I am a sem­i­nar­ian and church intern, and I greatly admire the Chris­tians who advo­cate for equal rights for and accom­pany our LGBTQQI sib­lings whether Chris­t­ian or not.” (Emily Morgan)

“In hos­pi­tal min­istry, I have been priv­i­leged to be present with folks in crit­i­cal life and death situations—both directly and through my stu­dents in Clin­i­cal Pas­toral Edu­ca­tion. For the first 20 years, I served in state men­tal hos­pi­tals. For the past 20 plus years I was the pri­mary chap­lain and CPE Super­vi­sor in a Uni­ver­sity Med­ical School Trauma 1 Med­ical Cen­ter. While many of the patients we served were afflu­ent, many also were strug­gling the make it to the next day. AIDS, home­less­ness, drugs, as well as diag­nos­able men­tal health issues, were impor­tant char­ac­ter­is­tics of the pop­u­la­tion we served. If the hos­pi­tal is not the pub­lic square, I do not know what is! Try­ing to be truly present with these folks and their fam­ily and friends is where the church should be. It was also a chal­lenge to be ade­quately present with staff. I served on our Bioethics com­mit­tee for 20 plus years. Hold­ing admin­is­tra­tion account­able for its jus­tice activ­ity was some­times most dif­fi­cult.” (Tim­o­thy Little)

“Mis­sion work­ers active around the world, able to link resources in their home/developed nations with the imme­di­ate needs of their host coun­tries; also, these mis­sion work­ers can be a voice for change and a yeast for social jus­tice active in the places where they serve (as well as a prophetic reminder back home to be good stew­ards of the resources God has pro­vided). This response comes from my expe­ri­ence serv­ing for three years in Chin­hoyi, Zim­babwe (1989–1992) as a pas­tor affil­i­ated with the Pres­by­ter­ian Church of South­ern Africa. Between being involved in build­ing a church, orga­niz­ing an orphan­age, and lead­ing offi­cer train­ing sem­i­nars on top­ics rang­ing from AIDS pre­ven­tion to church finances, I was blessed to part­ner with and learn from a wide array of local fam­i­lies, guest work­ers, and mis­sion vol­un­teers from sev­eral Chris­t­ian com­mu­ni­ties.” (Randy Bush)

“Dr. Mar­tin Luther King Jr. is a strong exam­ple of how the gospel of Jesus Christ can be engaged in the world. He showed the world how the gospel can be rel­e­vant to issues of social change, if we take the inter­re­la­tion of the cross, love, God’s power, the world’s suf­fer­ing, and Jesus death and res­ur­rec­tion seri­ously in rela­tion to the Chris­t­ian faith.” (Dawan Buie)

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