Conservatism
and Liberalism
(Editorial - September 2004)
In the brotherhood (its prosperous areas in particular) there is a tension which seems always to have existed: that between conservatism and liberalism. Perhaps this is a superficial observation. Still, it might help one to cope through the heated disagreements that can break out among us.
The conservative view
Conservatives want to conserve, to preserve what has been and thus
ensure a continuity and consistency of existence. If this is our bent,
we might tend to focus on doctrinal purity, and to have a penchant for
formalism⎯the strictures of form and appearance⎯sometimes at the
expense of content. We focus on dressing the "right" way, on saying the "right" things, and on believing the "right" things. We can act like we view personal failure and fragility as spiritual malfunction, a thing to be quarantined and "solved" lest the whole flock be infected.
This way of viewing people's problems, or their problematic thinking, can render us incapable of expressing the loving compassion and patience that some kinds of problems require of us. We can be harsh and condemning toward those who fall into moral ditches, but age and experience can reveal our own, and our children's, frailties. And so the old Pharisees were the first to turn and walk away, declining to condemn the woman taken in adultery.
Conservatism in action
In our effort to conserve and to preserve our beliefs and
organizational traditions, we can become rigid and mean-spirited,
perpetually suspicious and ready for contention and debate. We can, in
extreme cases, become obsessed with the definition, categorization, and
unending search for doctrinal declension, or sin in others. And we can
be excoriating when we believe we detect it, either in another's life,
his reasoning, or in his intentions. We hit, and hit hard, when we
perceive that someone's teaching is what we consider wrong or even
different from the norm. We can be like the Lord's men, who had a love
of strife (Luke 22:24).
Is it possible that we need to learn to release our fearful obsession with sin, and to refocus on the expressing and feeling of love for each other? Can we perhaps strengthen what we have inherited by changing our (perhaps unconscious) "sin search" paradigm to one of "service search"? If my focus is to be like Christ, to serve with love and compassion, then this changes my whole emotional orientation toward you. Yes, we'll still need to address quirks and twists in teaching, and we'll still need to acknowledge the sinfulness of sin if, through the fragility of the flesh, one of us should fall into adultery, hatred, wrath, or any of those other things that make one ashamed. Still, our whole approach will be one of friendship, of fellow feeling toward those who have fallen, as Christ with us, when we were wretched and without hope, dead in our sins.
Conservatives need to remember to love, even the erring. Slashing, bitter contention is not indicative of love.
The liberal point of view
Liberals want a diversity of voices. If this is our orientation, we
want to be inclusive, to treat people with respect even if we might
disagree with them. Liberal inclusiveness is opposed to the inherently
exclusive tendency of conservatism. Liberals react with distaste and
sometimes with horror to what they see as the restrictive
strait-jacketing and obsessive, empty formalism of their conservative
brethren.
They do not, contrary to conservative suspicions, dislike rules or structure. What they hate is the hypocrisy which battles and brawls in defense of God's truth and yet fails to acknowledge and to demonstrate God's love, which is fundamental to His truth. Liberals often are people who have been profoundly hurt by the insensitive hardness of their conservative brethren toward those the conservatives have deemed to be moral, doctrinal, or formalistic deviants.
A weakness we have, as liberals, is that our reaction against conservatism can take us too far into the arena of toxic pluralism, where every voice assumes equal importance. The resulting openness to accepting diverse "truths" renders us incapable of identifying the Truth. All ideas are not equal, are not equally credible, or useful. Is it possible that we, as liberals, need to remember that doctrine is vital to hope? What hope have we without defined belief? To discard doctrine is to evince a lack of love for those we care for.
Living together
"Love one another," he said in the upper room.
We often fail to comprehend what a difficult challenge he set them. It was a command rather than a suggestion. Liberals and conservatives need to trust each other, and to lower their suspicious distrust of each other's intentions and motives.
Was Christ a liberal? Was he a conservative? Did he call liberals and conservatives to be his disciples? It would seem so. How must Simon Zelotes have gotten on with Matthew, whom Simon might have considered a Roman minion?
In all likelihood, Christ's ecclesia (i.e., his disciples) consisted of liberals, conservatives, and moderates, all in the one ecclesia. Travel and experience have taught us that when brethren work together, these are the healthiest ecclesias, not the ones that have been created in support of a liberal or conservative crotchet or personality. It is not always spiritually helpful for us to have the option to run away from our problems in one ecclesia to join an ecclesia comprised of people who all share our specific orientation or view on a particular issue. We need our thinking and our assumptions to be challenged so that they can become better, more balanced. This happens when we learn to respect and tolerate each other, in an ecclesial environment where there is a mixture of personalities and points of view.
Our own bent rooted in our past
In Christ's ecclesia in the gospels, liberals and conservatives had to
walk away from their assumptions and prejudices, to be one in Christ
Jesus. Can we do the same? Have we the courage to do it? Will
conservatives and liberals rend the body of Christ in their zeal for
its defense?
I have been thinking, observing myself, about the degree to which a person's tendency toward either conservatism or liberalism is conditioned by his/her experiences in life, especially in childhood. So much conservative thinking and behavior seems a fearful reaction against the unstable, unpredictable randomness of the environment around us, and our own individual and powerful propensities.
We control to feel safe. We feel safer with clear definition, with classification and with schedules and practices which change only if improvement is certain. No doubt liberalism is rooted in our past. Here the reaction is a rejection of being controlled. With this mindset we feel safer with a communal discussion, a sharing of ideas and approaches. This can demonstrate a reaction against the suppression of the individual in the interests of the block group.
Liberalism and conservatism can be viewed as reactions to how one has been treated. We need to understand our own point of view, to be mature enough to understand and interact with our brother and our sister. Can we respect each other and achieve unity despite our diversity?
Dev Ramcharan