Mission In Ireland Today

Accessed from www.rte.ie

Last week we thought about religion in Ireland from a sociological perspective and explored the claim made by Durkheim, Weber and Wilson that secularization is a uni-directional, irreversible process. We also considered the phenomenon of globalization and noted that secular-leaning sociologists have suggested that with modernization on a worldwide scale comes secularization.  The fact remains that neither of these assumptions are beyond question.  Religion is strong in many parts of the world (including Latin America which has been impacted greatly by globalization) and there is what you might call a conservative reaction to secularization and globalization happening in many contexts. Moreover,  theories about secularization seem to be too mechanistic and too wedded to evolutionary theory. Human beings are reflexive agents who can influence social trends and not merely function as their pawns. 

Faith in Ireland

Having set the context from a sociological perspective,  it is time to explore in some depth mission in contemporary Ireland. Steve Skuce (and some others who have written about the current situation) suggest that Ireland as a whole (North and South) is saying farewell – one at perhaps a swifter rate than the other - to the forms of Christendom that have been so overwhelmingly dominant in Ireland’s past.  By Christendom,  we do not mean the church’s presence in society (that will continue),  but its historic centre place. 

Republic of Ireland

The Republic of Ireland for the majority of its history has functioned overwhelmingly as an expression of Christendom. In 1976 an American scholar, Bruce Francis Biever, published a survey of religious and moral attitudes of Dublin Catholics that was carried out in the 1960s.  The results are stunning in terms of the obviously pivotal role the church played in society at that time.

87% of correspondents disagreed with the statement that if there is a conflict between the church and state, the state should prevail. 

84% agreed that ‘if I had a son, I would surely wish him to be a priest, above and beyond everything else in the world.

82% disagreed that the church’s view on sex was out of date.

73% disagreed that the pleasurable sensations associated with sex are good.
 

How do we know, therefore, that things have changed rapidly and radically in the intervening period? Apart from surveys that we will examine in some detail, I would direct you to books such as The End of Irish Catholicism? by Vincent Twomey and Skuce’s interesting little book Faith Reborn which both trace this relatively sudden reversal of fortunes for the mainstream churches.

  

A simple way in to understanding the change of outlook which has taken place in the Republic of Ireland is this potted summary of recent key events.  

1.     Changes in the laws of the Republic have marked a turning away from Catholic moral influence (e.g. the legalization of divorce, the widespread availability of contraceptives, the legalization of homosexual practices and the recent Protection of Life During Pregnancy Act which itself came fast on the heels of civil partnership legislation that had been initiated in 2010.) There is little question that especially in regard to moral teaching, the Catholic church has lost much of its power to influence. Two random examples from surveys taken in 1981, 1990 and 1999 respectively  illustrate the rapid loss of church authority in these matters.  The percentage of the population saying abortion was never justified fell from 83% in 1981, to 66% in 1990, to 60% in 1999.  On the issue of homosexuality, the percentage saying the practice was never justified fell from 62% in 1981, to 56% in 1990, to 38% in 1999.




Paedophile priest, Fr. Brenden Smyth Accessed from irishcentral.com

2.    Another key factor in recent Irish history is the impact of clerical child-abuse and the widespread loss of confidence in the Catholic Church as a result of that Church’s perceived dealing with the issue. Arguably, the Catholic Church may never recover substantially from the damage done by abuse and the church’s apparent complicity in protecting abusers. 



3.    The recent impact of the Celtic Tiger economy which helped create a more materialistic and less caring Ireland. 

4.    Global culture and global values sweeping away traditional culture and traditional values.  This is evidenced in the dramatic increase in cohabitation and the rate of births outside marriage, the fall in church attendance and, in the case of Roman Catholicism,  an unprecedented decline in the numbers of those training for the priesthood.  Take these figures collated by Dr RD Stephens regarding vocations to the Roman Catholic priesthood. 1965 – the figure was 1,375. By 1994 – 201. 1998 – the figure was 92 and by 2000 – 61. A recent report in The Times of London predicted that in 20 years time Ireland will have two thirds less priests.  The Irish Catholic newspaper put the figure as a drop from 4,752 to 1,500 in 2028. Brian McFadden’s hit of a few years back (Irish Son) perfectly highlights the way old attitudes and old attachments are being left behind. 

5. The fall in church involvement has been accompanied by an increasingly multi-cultural and inter-faith Ireland. According to a survey done on Religion and Nationality in the Republic, there are now over 30,000 Muslims resident in Southern Ireland. 

Northern Ireland

Northern Ireland has also had its own marked religious decline.  A joint study involving Queen’s University and the University of Ulster in 2005, based on a statistical accumulation of surveys conducted between 1989 and 2004,  found that Catholic Church attendance had dropped from 90% to 62%. Presbyterian attendance dropped from just under 50% to 40%.

Church of Ireland attendance from slightly under 40% to 35%. 

The two most worrying statistics from a church vantage point are that by the time of the 2001 census 13.9% of the population described themselves as having no religion or refused to state a religion. Other research bears out that the youngest group studied – those born between 1985 and 1996 – were the age category who were the most likely to claim to have no religion.  (Northern Ireland: Churches face dramatic decline.  Ekklesia 25 Nov 2005  Religioscope www.info.religion)

Ambivalent Statistical Evidence

Before we move on from statistics I wish to mention the results of a 2008 Irish Examiner/RedC opinion poll from the Republic of Ireland which sought to assess the state of faith in Ireland. What is interesting is that the level of core belief in the country is much stronger than one might imagine. Even though church attendance has dropped to 45%, 84% still believe in God, and an incredible 53% accept the reality of hell. So the situation is still one where people are becoming unchurched or de-churched but not necessarily secularized yet. However,  it is still not possible to take too much comfort from these facts since distance from religious practice inevitably leads to an ignorance of the basic convictions of Christianity. Thus this generation may be more unchurched than secularized, but the same could not be said of a subsequent generation begotten by this one.

Conclusions

Ireland as a whole faces a situation where the religious landscape will be dramatically changed and the old monolithic structures of Catholic Ireland and Protestant Ulster replaced by a brand new mission context. One that is not devoid of features of the old, but sufficiently new to warrant new approaches.

I want to paint a very rough picture of what this new Ireland might look like and remind you of some of the opportunities that this might afford the churches.  

We face a situation which may mean co-operation at a scale hitherto unknown in Ireland.  Thus whilst the church may have had its day as an institution wielding political and social power, it has a chance to rediscover itself as a movement which can influence the culture afresh but this time as a diaspora in the terms suggested by Karl Rahner and Joseph Ratzinger.

What are the contours of this new Ireland that may be emerging?  
 

Spock and Kirk accessed from sodahead.com

 

 

I have prefaced some of these descriptions with the word ‘more’ because some of these features are an intensification of what is already happening.  There is also a sense in which being ‘more something’ does not entirely negate what is being replaced.  The change is not a total change and substantial remnants of what was there will remain.  So the new Ireland,  North and South, will be;

 

More Post Christian.  

More and more people will have looser links to their religious past and will forge their own path.  Again this is reflected in the European value survey of 1999 where just under 24% of the group aged between 18-24 went to church every week as against 75% in 1990.

More post denominational

There is a sense in which only a fat and satisfied Christendom can afford the luxury of a very denominational mentality.  The burgeoning strength of secularism will function as a wake-up call to many and there will be a greater impetus to make common cause with those who share a similar faith and values.  Moreover, church involvement will be increasingly less defined by duty and loyalty and more by the consumer mindset. ‘What suits me or what does it do for me?’ may be more important than whether this is my own denomination.

More postmodern 

Arguably the modernist mindset with its emphasis on rational, linear thought; respect for institutions and hierarchies … is being replaced by a postmodern mindset which reacts to truth claims proclaimed as dogma,  rails against the law of non-contradiction and is looking for authentic experience.

A missiologist called Stuart Murray summed up the traits of folks living in the emerging post modern culture as these – and I wonder how many of them apply to people you know in Ireland, north or south:

• Truth is relative – it’s what works for me. It’s fine if you’re a Christian and that’s your thing, but it doesn’t do it for me.
• Not impressed by authoritative institutions. 
• A deep commitment to individual choice. It’s up to me what I do and nobody should be telling me.
• I’ve said this already. A readiness to hold together contradictory beliefs and not to be worried about logical coherence. Don Carson, a very conservative New Testament scholar said that soon there will be devotees of both John Calvin and reincarnation.
• A deep concern for the environment and
• An understanding of humanity as part of this environment, rather than separate from it. Thus some Eco Warriors and Animal Rights activists.

More broken

The collapse of the old social mores as a result of individualism and pluralism may mean there is less to hold the society together and secure models of family and togetherness may become less and less the norm.
 

More spiritual

Sinead O'Connor accessed at fanpop.com

Sinead O’Connor comments,

‘As a race we feel empty. This is because our spirituality has been wiped out and we don’t know how to express ourselves. As a result we’re encouraged to fill that gap with alcohol, drugs, sex or money. People out there are screaming for the truth.’

If the thought of Sinead O’Connor is anything to go by, there is still a spiritual hunger in Ireland but one which does not expect relief from the ministrations of the church. Ironically, there may be a perception that the church is too modern and too rational for those seeking spiritual solace in the likes of the Body/Mind/Spirit section of so many of our bookshops.


 

 

Four Pathways

That is the situation that I suspect we are moving into and I want to suggest four pathways forward for the church and some thoughts about how these ways forward can be practically engaged with by ordinands and any other concerned Christians.

 

1. Move towards a more plural expression of church.

The traditional parish system with its inherited ways of doing things is not to be disparaged but there is an increasing place for new expressions of church to complement the parish system.  This is still in its very infancy in the Church of Ireland and what I say reflects more my English experience, though with Boring Wells and Rathmines there is evidence of greater flexibility and more thinking outside the box here.  The hope might be that a growing place would be found for fresh expressions of church perhaps targeted towards specific groups where interested outsiders can simply ask questions. Churches that do not carry all their eggs in one basket and have more than one point of entry will be crucial for the future health of the denomination.  This goal may be attempted through more or less conventional church planting but perhaps also through daring community initiatives where ‘church’ may initially be a committed group of people living in an area responding to significant social needs. What is needed is creativity.

2.  Mission as dialogue, meal and pilgrimage.

The days of the authoritative institution may be over but the core message of the faith may be presented in a context which allows for dialogue, table fellowship and journey.  Alpha, Emmaus and other by now almost traditional approaches highlight the effectiveness of this approach. New mission strategies can take these approaches to the workplaces and the neighbourhoods and out of church halls.  

3. Mission as partnership

This is a multi-faceted opportunity which has the potential to unite the Anglican church (a) with non-religious people of good will as together they respond to grave social needs;  (b) within itself as wealthier parishes in terms of finance and personnel liaise with and support other parishes in the development of new mission strategies; and with other denominations as they increasingly do Kingdom work together. 

4. Mission as the building of authentic community.

Relational mission in a postmodern Ireland may increasingly be the most effective means of promoting the faith.  Congregations that have a warm and vibrant life to share can minister to people who are affected by issues such as individualism,  family breakdown, racism and sectarianism and in doing that ‘image out’ more the new reconciled community that Christ sought to establish. 

I love this quote from John Drane’s The McDonaldization of the Church.

‘In a world of dysfunctional relationships in which people are hurting and constantly being put down, either by individuals or by the more impersonal operations of the system in general, many are desperately seeking for a place where they can belong and be valued. For the majority the entry point to anything that might be regarded as ‘fulness of life’ will begin and end when they find a safe place where they can be themselves, and be affirmed and lifted up in the human struggle.’

 

CONNECTIONS?

How do we make connections between these aspirations and what is done in ministry?   The short answer is ‘Exposure, exposure, exposure.’ Church planting was an alien concept to me until I worked as a curate in a church that had been planted 20 odd years before. Passion for the unchurched was created through exposure to the RUN network. 

Catching a vision through meeting those engaged in this kind of mission, through visiting parishes that are beginning to develop these strategies, through participating in mission initiatives whilst on placement,  through learning to nurture lay leadership via engagement with where that’s already happening – this kind of exposure all serves to take these themes beyond the classroom and text book into personal experience. Today is the day of small beginnings but exposure to effective mission strategies will inspire the future leader.

 

I want to close by sharing a thought – a positive one about our own religious situation in Ireland. I am quoting here from an Irish sociologist who has a realistic perspective on the situation we’re facing. Tony Fahy says this,

‘The explanation for the varying fortunes of organized religion [he means Britain and the UK where it seems to be flagging and the US where it’s succeeding] is to be found in the ability or otherwise of the churches to respond appropriately to the demand that is there for religion. The organisations will thrive in so far as they are properly responsive to the religious needs of the people.’ 

In other words, there is no inevitability about decline or, sadly, about revival.  Our challenge is to be relevant, wise, passionate and caring.

The Role of Religion in Irish Society

Accessed from www.tcd.ie

The purpose of this post is to familiarise you with the role that religion plays in Irish society. What will be different from what you might expect is that we will not be thinking about religion from a religious or a faith perspective. We are going to take off our ‘clerical glasses’ and consider religion in Ireland from the standpoint of a sociologist. 

A sociological view of faith

The sociologist may not know anything about the religious life as a participant but he or she will work very hard at describing what they witness of religion’s role and impact in society.  Indeed, certain questions will demand attention when considering the phenomenon of religion.

What is the essence of religion?  How has religion been affected by what has been happening over the development of history?   Are we in the midst of a tidal wave of secularization and is this sweeping away the church?  What will de-institutionalization and globalization mean for religion? 

What is religion?

 

Joseph Runzo in a book entitled Global Philosophy of Religion defines religion as a world religious tradition with many common characteristics. According to Runzo,

A World Religious tradition is a set of symbols and rituals, myths and stories, concepts and truth-claims, which a historical community believes gives ultimate meaning to life, via its connection to a Transcendent beyond the natural order.

An even more comprehensive definition comes from the book Religion for Dummies written by Rabbi Marc Gellman and Monsignor Thomas Hartman. According to these authors,

‘A religion is a belief in divine (superhuman or spiritual) being(s) and the practices (rituals) and the moral code (ethics) that result from that belief. Beliefs give religion its mind, rituals give religion its shape, and ethics give religion its heart.’

Another important definition, and one to really bear in mind for this post, is the one put forward by those who write about the secularization of society.  The term religion, according to Bryan Wilson, must pertain ‘only to those activities that make some explicit reference to a supernatural source of values.’   The logic of that statement is that where those activities seem not to exist then religion is not present. The only comment one can make in response is that while explicit religious activities can act as some kind of gauge for the current state of a culture– it is probably too reductionist to suggest that they are the sole measurement of what a religion is.

Take, for example, these other two definitions of religion.  David Lyon in the book, The Steeple’s Shadow,  notes that ‘religion’ also includes the phenomenon of what some authors call Folk Religion.  This is where lives are lived with a sort of residual reference to whatever may have been the dominant religion in a culture. I had a French friend who never went to Mass but often visited her local church, lit candles, and generally orientated herself towards whatever was there.  One might also include wearing a crucifix for luck or feeling the need to christen a child as a religious insurance policy as further examples of folk religion. This kind of religion is actually fairly durable even though it would not show up much under Wilson’s definition. 

There is also what Robert Bellah identified as ‘civil religion’ which is a general Deistical approach to God which acknowledges his reality and pays lip service to certain religious values. An example of what Bellah is talking about might be a Presidential inauguration in the United States where God is evoked in the name of the country and the President.

Modernity, secularization and religion

As we move on to consider religion as an influence in society – we have to turn our attention to how it has been affected by two factors that have been quite significant for Western Europe and North America.  The first is the relationship between modernity and religion and the second (and of course they are not unrelated) is the impact of secularization on society.

What one can say fairly incontrovertibly is that modernity, especially where it has been deeply influenced by the Enlightenment, has turned away from religious authority and religious explanations of existence. Nature and evolution (at least as understood in the terms that Dawkins presents them) are perceived by some moderns as the real grid by which life can be understood.  Evolution as an all-encompassing, naturalistic account of how life came into being causes Dawkins to describe himself as an intellectually fulfilled atheist. The fact that he is such a protagonist for his case, and that there is such an evangelistic passion present in his writing, suggests that he does not think everyone has bought the Enlightenment paradigm quite as thoroughly as they ought to have done. But that is another matter.

What about secularization and its impact on society? This is an issue that is very complex and we need to try to disentangle the various threads so that we can understand what we are actually describing when we talk about secularization. First,  we need to be very careful in our use of terms.  I would suggest that the distinction between secularization and secularism is very important to grasp.  Secularization is a neutral term. It is simply the name given to a process that is visible within society. Secularism is an aggressive anti-religious outlook.  The British Humanist Association, for example, is made up of people who are secularists, who complain and campaign against the one time privileged position of Christianity in education and society. Dawkins, Hitchens and other aggressive atheists are following what one would call a secularist agenda. They want to undermine as far as possible the place of religion in society and the general consciousness.

Secularization,  put at its most basic and uncontroversial,  is the process by which religion or faith is uncoupled from its connection to institutions in societies. For example, in France it was the case that the Catholic church had been a substantial provider of education until the twentieth century.  This is now no longer the case. That is secularization.  It could be argued that with the dearth of vocations to religious orders that the Catholic schools of Ireland are undergoing their own process of secularization.  Interestingly, if one wanted to bring Pope Emeritus Bendict XVI into this conversation,  one might note that it was his view as a cardinal that even in church institutions like hospitals and universities – where there was no longer a faith commitment on the part of those staffing the institutions – these bodies should undergo voluntary secularization.

The Secularization Debate

Thus far we have seen secularization as the process whereby religion’s public role is diminished and it loses its connections with the institutions in which it previously had a pivotal place. One might also, uncontroversially, describe secularization as the process by which the public’s engagement with the rites and practices of religion has increasingly diminished.  No-one will dispute, for example,  that in western Europe there has been rapid secularization and that religious practice is alien to a huge section of the population. However, we have only scratched the surface of the issue of secularization. There is much more to it – and indeed, the judgment one makes of what secularization is telling us about the true nature of things – will have some impact on how confidently one will pursue one’s own future ministry.

To set the scene for what I would term ‘the secularization debate’, let me share with you a stanza from one of the most poignant poems ever written. The poem in question is Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold, and the third stanza about ‘the sea of Faith’ has inspired and given its name to a radical movement within the Church of England that questions the presumption of theism.  (By that, I mean the presumption that an objective God, such as is identified by the Creeds, actually exists).  Don Cupitt, the theologian most identified with the Sea of Faith (evangelicals in the C of E have rather unkindly given him the nickname ‘Stupid Cupitt) openly identifies as a non-realist theologian. Realist in this context means ‘belief in the objective existence of God.’ Cupitt would describe God much more in terms of the highest ideals of human beings and those things which are of ultimate meaning to them.

Dover Beach

Matthew Arnold accessed at loveaquote.com

The Sea of Faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earth's shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled.
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.

 

That opening, positive description of the sea of faith is a metaphor of the time (and Arnold probably had the Middle Ages in mind) when religion could be experienced without the doubt that the modern (then Victorian) age had evoked through Darwinism and the impact of the Industrial Revolution. Arnold seems to believe that the prevalence of religion was a good thing and that it beautified the world with its simple assurance of meaning and purpose.  When religion was intact, as Arnold saw it, the world was dressed ‘like the folds of a bright girdle furled.’  Now that this faith has gone, the world lies there stripped naked and bleak.  He writes of ‘the vast edges drear/ And naked shingles of the world.’

The crucial question

Is that where we are going and was Matthew Arnold one of the first to witness a steady, uni-directional, inexorable movement towards the extinction of faith? Are we, indeed, dinosaurs, anomalous creatures still living in a world to which we truly no longer belong? I ask that question partly because the poem demands it, but also because it lies at the heart of a particular view of secularization.

Durkheim et
 

Max Weber accessed at doktorpaisal.wordpress.com



Emile Durkheim accessed at abordandosociologia.blogspot.ie

It is at this point that I want to introduce you to two of the classical sociologists of religion, the Frenchman Emile Durkheim and the German, Max Weber. Durkheim promoted the view that religion was part of the primitive stage of human development and that it had no on-going relevance for modern human beings.  In other words, it was something that individuals and society as a whole would grow out of. Along a similar trajectory, Webber emphasized the fact that mankind was becoming ever more rational and that this very process (which included modernization and the rise of technology) would marginalize religion.   Bryan Wilson sums up the general sense of what secular sociologists see taking place.

Religion is now privatized. In a consumer society it becomes another consumer good, a leisure time activity no longer affecting the centres of power or the operation of the system – even at the level of social control,  and the organization of the emotions and motivations. Religion has become a matter of choice, but whatever religion is chosen is of no consequence to the operation of the social system.

WHAT DO WE THINK OF THAT STATEMENT?  My sense is that much of Wilson’s description is accurate since a large swathe of western Europe does function from a secular starting point and religion has been sidelined in terms of decision-making and ethical guidelines. However, has he presumed too much for the Enlightenment worldview?  It is his assumption that rationality and the dominance of that mindset has made religious faith an impossibility for the masses. He writes,

Modern man [and I would stress ‘modern’ and not ‘postmodern’) may suffer acutely from his lack of emotional reassurance, but it also appears that religion is no longer capable of providing this reassurance for the mass of men.’

However, with the proliferation of New Age ideas alone, it would seem that the rationalistic mindset has not quite determined the future in the way Wilson and others assumed. But that is perhaps to jump ahead.  What must be stated is that the sociologists of secularization really did believe it was a uni-directional, inexorable process. In fact, one of the reasons for why this was the case was that the Darwinian idea of evolution was lifted out of its biological context and applied to society’s development.  Thus religion itself was thought of as an evolutionary hangover, rather than an integral part of life.

Here is a quotation that illustrates this point. It is written by a man called Caplow and he is referring to the work of sociologist Robert Lynd, a former Presbyterian minister who saw secularization as an almost evolutionary certainty.

Like many other sociologists of his time, he viewed social evolution as an inevitable progression from social forms based on custom to social forms based on rational planning. According to this view, drawn from 19^th century extensions of Darwin’s discussion of the origin of species to social institutions, modern religion was supposed to be a vestige of a more primitive stage of society and was expected to disappear. This gradual but inevitable disappearance was called secularization.’

Reaching some conclusions

If that evolutionary view is correct, if this movement away from religion is an inexorable tide sweeping through history, then Christianity’s days are numbered.  We are simply caught up in an inevitability and religion is nothing more than a primitive prop. The over-riding question at this point is whether or not such a bleak perspective is justified.

Referring back to the poem, Dover Beach, Matthew Arnold refers to a period in history (probably the Middle Ages) where people lived happily under what has been termed ‘a sacred canopy’ . In other words, it was a time of widespread belief with religion at the very centre of life.  This assumption, at least as it’s expressed in the poem, fits well with the idea that there has been a sort of evolutionary development within society so that the need to ‘believe’ has become redundant over time and that we are now in that age of natural scepticism.

You probably will be pleased to know that such a ‘take’ on European religious history has been questioned within the field of sociology itself. The first open dissent from the received wisdom came in 1965 in a ground-breaking article by David Martin entitled ‘Towards eliminating the concept of secularization’ in the book The Penguin Survey of the Social Sciences. Martin’s essential point was that those who were promoting the concept of secularization – and remember, we are not talking about simply the view that Europe is becoming more secularised, but the conviction that secularization is an irreversible process in humanity’s social development – those who were promoting that concept, Martin says,  were ideologically biased and were actively promoting an anti-religious ideology.  In other words, they allowed their atheistic presuppositions to colour their understanding of cultural history.

One example of where that misunderstanding was present, claims Martin, was the presumption that religion was at the very heart of Medieval society (and therefore something that was utterly central to peoples’ lives.)  This was not necessarily the case, suggests Martin,  who thinks that only an educated elite ever embraced a Christian worldview and that for the rest it was more a straightforward mixture of superstition with some elements of Christian piety. Even Benedict XVI, when he was a Professor at Tubingen, also made the point that the assumption that the Medieval period was an age of belief was over-stated to say the least. 

[We hear it said] claims Ratzinger … that in the Middle Ages everyone without exception in our lands was a believer, it is a good thing to cast a glance behind the scenes, as we can today, thanks to historical research.  This will tell us that even in those days there was the great mass of fellow-travellers and a relatively small number of people who had really entered into the inner movement of belief.’ (Introduction to Christianity)

The average secular punter of today who subscribes to New Age thinking or some other tangential spirituality may not be a million miles from a Medieval person only loosely connected to orthodox belief.

Moreover, what about the powerful growth of Protestant non-conformism among the middle class in England during the Industrial Revolution of all times. It appeared at the time that widespread growth was just around the corner and the failure of that dream was not due to the impact of rationality and technology – but to the devastation caused by the impact of World War I. That is what destroyed missionary optimism - not some irreversible process going on in society.

So it is possible to read history very differently from the secularization theorists.  What I suggest is the fundamental problem with their understanding of secularization is that it is too mechanistic. It denigrates the role of human beings in history reducing them to the status of being pawns to massive social forces.  I suggest, on the contrary – human beings are capable of responding or even reacting to cultural trends and not simply be their victims. Anywhere that religion has hugely affected the cultural mindset has been, in some degree, in reaction to prevailing trends.  Some historians believe that the impact of the Wesleyan revival in England was that the nation was spared a French style, secular revolution.  Culture is also affected by events, by unexpected turns, and not everything that is confidently predicted actually comes about or stays the course. There is no assured progress of secularization, no matter what.

Before we end this post by looking at globalization and its effect on religion, let me say a couple of positive things about what secularization may have done for the church. 1. It probably has finished off the Constantinian state church.  Cardinal Franz Koenig, the late Archbishop of Vienna, is one of those senior churchmen who see this as a most likely outcome of current trends. This is not necessarily a bad thing.  There is a case for suggesting that such an arrangement has an inherently diluting effect on the witness of the church.  Remember Nussbaum’s analogy of the child picking up the viper. Secondly, the kind of church that may emerge out of the secularization of the West will recognise itself in the New Testament as ‘the little flock.’ The NT does not view the church as a majority institution nor does it presume that wider society will be Christian. GOD CAN COPE WITH THAT REALITY. SO CAN WE!

Globalisation and its impact on religion. 

It may be helpful to offer some definitions of globalisation although we all have a sense of what it is.  One definition of the phenomena is, ‘The growing frequency, volume and interconnectedness of movement of ideas, materials, goods, money, information, and people across national boundaries.’  McLuhan’s term ‘Global village’ sums up that aspect of globalisation. We might also refer to it as the growing capacity of information technologies to dramatically shorten the distance in time and space between events and places in the world. We would certainly describe it as the diffusion of increasingly standardised economic, political and cultural practices. Finding a Marks & Spencers in Seville or eating a Big Mac in Freiburg may be tiny examples of that process.

Underlying the standard sociological reading of globalisation is the view that the modernization which characterised the secular development of Europe will have a knock-on effect on world culture. In other words, as countries undergo ‘modernization’ through the impact of globalization, they will become more secularised. Again the inevitability theme rears its head.

However,  it is by no means certain that globalisation will go the way many sociologists expect.  Firstly, this increased movement across frontiers has also meant the rapid numerical growth of religious Islam in Europe.  Globalisation can mean not only the export of western values to the rest of the world but also the introduction of religious influences from outside the secular west.

There is also a reaction to the ‘unwholesome’ values that are being peddled via globalisation. You might interpret Islamic fundamentalism as a reaction to what has been deemed a culture of dissoluteness - their response to what they term pejoratively, the great Satan. Indeed,  even among second and third generation Muslims in Europe whose parents are secularised are we finding substantial numbers re-embracing Islam?  Also worldwide there is a resurgence of conservative religion among others faiths such as Buddhism, Hinduism and Shintoism.

Let us not also forget the worldwide proliferation of Pentecostalism, particularly in Latin America where there is a palpable sense of religion in the air. It does not seem to be the same narrative in every part of the world and there may be unique cultural factors that make Europe’s secularization a uniquely European reality RATHER THAN Europe being the definitive model for everyone else’s future.

Those are just a few optimistic thoughts on globalisation, but if you want a substantial academic foundation for seeing globalisation as not sounding the death knell for faith, read Peter Beyer’s Religion in the Process of Globalization. 

The Irish Missionary Heritage and its Legacy

Image accessed at gcaptain.com

In this post we explore the roots of Irish Christianity.  Take a moment to reflect on some of the major figures of Celtic Christianity whom you identify with the fledgling Irish church. 

The eminent historian Alfred P Smyth offers one comprehensive insight on Irish Christian history which we need to bear in mind when considering this theme.  "The origins of Christianity in this island are shrouded in mystery".  The reason for this is that Ireland in the fifth century (the period when the identification with Christianity first began) was just emerging from pre-history,  having only recently come into contact with literate societies beyond its borders. Thus there were few written records from the time of how and where Christianity first took root.

What we do know about the origins of Irish Christianity

For many,  the starting point for Christianity in Ireland is 432 with the much vaunted arrival of St Patrick. The legend would tell us that the land was entirely pagan, and that through Patrick’s strenuous and almost solo efforts, Ireland was converted.  It was not quite as simple as that though there is more to the legend than an historical sceptic might presume.

What we do know from the writing of Prosper of Aquitaine is that Bishop Germanus of Auxerre who was sent to Britain by Pope Celestine to combat the Pelagian heresy in 429, had been sent at the instigation of a certain deacon from the papal court named Palladius. We are further informed by Prosper that this same deacon Palladius was ordained by Germanus in 431 and despatched to ‘take charge of those Irish believing in Christ.’  This is the earliest documentary evidence we have that there were enough Christians in Ireland to warrant the sending of a bishop.

We know little or nothing of the outcome of that mission except that Prosper claims that Celestine, through Palladius, made the barbarous island Christian. Other writers claim Palladius was either killed early on in his mission or left after being rejected by the Irish. The most general view is that he probably left not long after arriving. Some even believe that Patrick and Palladius were one and the same person.  The point to remember, though, is that we do not have enough evidence to come to definitive conclusions about some of these issues.

Saint Patrick

Given that we know very little about the first Christians and first missionaries on the island, Ireland is in the very unusual position of having two highly significant documents from the hands of an early fifth century bishop,  Patricius (Patrick) who was unquestionably a leading figure in the evangelization of the Irish.  The Confessio (St Patrick’s testimony of faith written at the end of his life) and his Letter Against The Warlord Coroticus reveal the mind and heart of a passionate missionary who had a phenomenal impact on the spread of Christianity in Ireland.

While Patrick’s psyche is what you might call an open book, there is tremendous controversy about his origins and his theological perspective.  The received wisdom about Patrick is that he grew up somewhere on the western seaboard of Britain, with Scotland, Wales or Cumbria being the most likely locations.  However, one scholar more recently has questioned the whole western seaboard hypothesis. Alfred P Smyth argues that

Patrick’s origins ought never to have been tied to the western seaboard of Britain because [in his two writings]he repeatedly describes a cultural setting for his family and for their society at large which reflects the [Roman] villa culture of lowland Britain.

This revisionist perspective makes Patrick most definitely a Roman Englishman whose spiriting away to Ireland was the result of an inland raid which involved the transportation of slaves to the coast.  An interesting and undisputed fact of Patrick’s history is that he grew up in a family with strong religious ties, his father being the deacon Calpurnias and his grandfather, the priest, Potitus. These were the days when celibacy was not compulsory and priests and deacons were permitted to marry.

Bishop Stephen Neill, the Anglican missiologist and church historian, outlines the received picture of Patrick’s life which we can work with even while acknowledging that there are unresolved questions.  According to this scheme, Patrick was born somewhere in Britain about 389AD and was carried off into slavery by a band of marauding Irishmen. His Christianity was extremely nominal and it was in captivity that he came to know the reality of God.  Here is his verbatim record of his conversion which stands alongside Augustine’s Confessions as one of the great spiritual autobiographies.

I was at that time about sixteen years of age. I did not, indeed, know the true God; and I was taken into captivity in Ireland with many thousands of people, according to our desserts, for quite drawn away from God, we did not keep his precepts, nor were we obedient to our priests who used to remind us of our salvation. And the Lord brought down on us the fury of his being and scattered us among many nations, even to the ends of the earth, where I, in my smallness, am now to be found among foreigners.

2 And there the Lord opened my mind to an awareness of my unbelief, in order that, even so late, I might remember my transgressions and turn with all my heart to the Lord my God, who had regard for my insignificance and pitied my youth and ignorance. And he watched over me before I knew him, and before I learned sense or even distinguished between good and evil, he protected me, and consoled me as a father would his son.

Reading this account one can sense the deeply personal nature of Patrick’s faith.  The following clip from the 1960s RTE series Give Up Your Oul Sins is an entertaining rendering of the traditional Patrick story highlighting his profound prayer life, visionary experiences, escape from Ireland and eventual Macedonian call to be a missionary to the land of his captivity.

Patrick returned to Ireland as a missionary bishop in 432.  Was it Mayo or Ulster which was his base? We cannot be absolutely certain, but what we do know is that he had phenomenal missionary success. He tells of journeys to regions ‘where never anyone had come to baptize, or ordain clergy, or to confirm the people.’ When his labour was completed,  which many believe was around 461,  the country was a largely Christian country (Neill). In Patrick’s own writings we are given a sense of the impact of his ministry to the heathen Irish. He asks this question:

41 So, how is it that in Ireland, where they never had any knowledge of God but, always, until now, cherished idols and unclean things, they are lately become a people of the Lord, and are called children of God; the sons of the Irish [Scotti] and the daughters of the chieftains are to be seen as monks and virgins of Christ.

He includes this fascinating snapshot from his ministry with this account of the conversion of a high-born Irish woman.

42 And there was, also, a most beautiful, blessed, native-born noble Irish woman of adult age whom I baptized; and a few days later she had reason to come to us to intimate that she had received a prophecy from a divine messenger [who] advised her that she should become a virgin of Christ and she would draw nearer to God. Thanks be to God, six days from then, opportunely and most eagerly, she took the course that all virgins of God take, not with their fathers' consent but enduring the persecutions and deceitful hindrances of their parents. Notwithstanding that, their number increases, (we do not know the number of them that are so reborn) besides the widows, and those who practise self-denial. Those who are kept in slavery suffer the most. They endure terrors and constant threats, but the Lord has given grace to many of his handmaidens, for even though they are forbidden to do so, still they resolutely follow his example.

From Patrick to Celtic Christianity

Patrick’s words recount the origins of monasticism in Ireland.  It would seem that for many of the original Irish converts this was the natural expression of discipleship.  Thus an early link emerges between the first great missionary of the Irish and the subsequent Celtic monastic church which is essentially the Irish missionary heritage. 

Included below is a useful summary of the impact of the Celtic church written by Ray Simpson, the author of Celtic Spirituality.  Arguably, it is an account written through somewhat rose-tinted glasses though it does highlight vital facets of the Celtic expression of faith.

Long before conflicts so tragically divided Christianity, the Celtic Church came to flower. It existed from the fifth to the twelfth centuries. The Celtic churches were orthodox in faith but diverse in practice, evangelised and maintained unity through friendship, respected women’s gifts, felt spiritually linked to creation, were bathed in the supernatural, and kept learning alive through the Dark ages.

The Celtic church was unique in many ways. The centre of life was not the diocese but the monastery and the senior ecclesiastical figure was the Abbot and not the Bishop.  The four outstanding  Celtic monasteries were Killiney, Clonard, Bangor and Clonmacnoise.  Monastic faith was often reckless and extreme by modern standards. There are tales of monks who would recite the whole Psalter while plunged in icy water, or stand so long in prayer with arms crossed that the birds had time to build their nests in their hair.  But what was most indomitable about them was their missionary spirit.

Celtic Christianity in context

To understand the Celtic missionary spirit,  one must become more familiar with the canvas on which Celtic missionary activity was played out. Essentially the Celtic mission took place in the context of what has become known as the Dark Ages.

Roman civilization had been destroyed in Europe in the wake of the sack of Rome in 410 AD.  Barbarian northern tribes (largely Germanic) had invaded the empire and destroyed the arts,  architecture and libraries of Europe. For 500 years, the task of the Western Church was to win these ‘barbarian’ peoples to Christianity,  re-convert the Arian barbarians (those who had already imbibed a heterodox version of Christianity) to orthodox faith,  and ultimately renew the faith of the Christian populations who had fallen into laxity and immorality during this time of great cultural upheaval.

The fact that this was achieved to any significant extent was down to three factors – royal favour (e.g. the conversion of various Anglo-Saxon kings), martyrdom and monasticism,  and more particularly Celtic monasticism.  Within a century of Patrick’s death, Irish Celtic Christians were taking the faith beyond the land of their birth into a Europe that was decimated by the destruction of Latin civilization.  The first well-known Celtic monk to leave Irish shores was the nobleman Columba who founded a monastery on Iona in Scotland.  From there the Celtic monks evangelized the Picts (who were another Celtic tribe).  It was after Columba’s death in 597 that the mission work of Iona entered its most significant phase.  Within a century of Columba’s arrival in Iona (563AD) the Picts were substantially Christian.

By the early 7^th century (633AD),  Iona commissioned an entourage led by Aidan to establish a monastic community on a tidal island called Lindisfarne, off the coast of North East England.  This place was to prove as vital a missionary centre as its mother house, Iona.  From Lindisfarne,  monks penetrated far down into England and those areas held by the pagan Angles and Saxons.  This was a case of cross-cultural mission to the Germanic Anglo-Saxons.

In considering cross cultural Celtic mission,  it is impossible to ignore the ministry of Columbanus and the community of monks at Bangor Abbey.  Columbanus became what some have termed ‘a wanderer for Christ’ who at the age of 40 set out on his travels. His first port of call was eastern France where he founded a monastery at Luxeuill in Burgundy. 20 years subsequent to this he fell foul of the Burgundian court and set out with his Celtic monks to preach the gospel to the still pagan peoples who lived around Lake Constance. Driven out once again by Burgundian influence, he retired to die in another of his famous foundations,  the monastery of Bobbio in Italy.  This brief overview of Columbanus’ ministry gives us an impression of the sweep of Celtic missionary expansion. One of the monks who accompanied Columbanus from Ireland was Gall who became the ‘apostle’ of north eastern Switzerland.  The legendary bear who came out of the woods to help him build his hermitage is still to be seen in the coat of arms of the Swiss city, St Gallen.  According to Methodist missiologist George Hunter III, Columbanus’ monastic followers founded a vast network of sixty or more monastic communities,  learned a dozen or more languages and cultures, planted churches and lay the groundwork for the subsequent conversion of the majority of the Germanic peoples.

If this reading of European history is accurate,  Celtic Christianity had over several generations of sustained mission re-evangelized Europe and helped bring Europe out of the dark ages. Even the monks who stayed behind in the monasteries had a huge role in this undertaking because of their labours in the scriptoria or specialised writing rooms where they copied the learning of the past onto new parchment, thus preserving for posterity much of the classic literature of Greece and Rome. It is for that kind of reason that Thomas Cahill could write the book, How The Irish Saved Civilization and the race as a whole became known as ‘the land of saints and scholars.

The demise of the Celtic church

What was it that eventually brought Celtic enthusiasm and the Celtic way of mission to an end?  Some scholars (e.g. Hunter and Bosch) argue that it was the Roman wing of the church with its demand for absolute conformity that ultimately inhibited and finally eclipsed this form of mission. Bosch expresses the argument in these terms:

By and large …Catholicism endorsed the principle that a ‘missionary church’ must endorse in every detail the Roman innovation of the moment.’ 

Thus Roman absolutism (according to this view), won out in the end and the great lessons learnt about mission were lost.

What can we learn from Celtic Christianity?
 

Acessed at tbphfx.blogspot.ie

This final segment of the post must carry a significant caveat with it. In attempting to answer the above question I am presenting a somewhat idealised form of Celtic Christianity.  The reality was much less pristine and wholesome than would appear from the principles enunciated below. Nevertheless the values we will explore genuinely found their roots in a Celtic approach to faith.

 

Radical Model of Evangelism. 

In contrast to many current approaches to evangelism which are individualistic and sporadic in nature, the Celts usually evangelised in teams. Moreover, these teams were committed long-term to their place of mission.

Radical Formation for Mission. 

In the monasteries monks were trained to live lives of depth, compassion and power for mission.  This was usually through a five fold learning framework. (a) They were taught how to use solitude to enhance spiritual growth. This was achieved through voluntary isolation in a primitive cell in some out of the way setting. (b) They developed the practice of accountability in which a monk spent time with a soul friend (anamchara) who was not so much a spiritual director but a peer to whom he was vulnerable and accountable. (c) Monks were also placed in what amounted to a small group led by someone with acknowledged spiritual maturity. In Taize they would call this an approfondisement group, a deepening group. (d) They enjoyed the whole gamut of common life (‘life together’ as Bonhoeffer once put it when describing the seminary life of members of the Confessing Church in Nazi Germany) where through meals, work, worship, and laughter they (e) gained knowledge and insight about ministry and spirituality which fitted them for mission.

Radical Model of Prayer.

The Celts learned how to use the imagination in prayer and so-called right brain activities involving intuition and creativity fuelled their prayer life. They learned how to see the reality of God in the ordinary things of the world.

Radical Model of Interior Mission 

The Celtic monasteries showed profound hospitality to visitors of all sorts.  One might say these monks did not just penetrate communities external to them but invited people to be their guest and brought them into the spiritual life of the monastery. Through their exposure to this life, to fellowship with the monks etc, they found their way to faith.

Marked Contrast With Roman Model of Evangelism.

All of this amounted to a radical contrast with the Roman model of mission which was much less relational and far more rationalistic, according to George Hunter.

Roman Model                                                       Celtic Model

Presentation                                                         Fellowship

Decision                                                               Ministry and Conversations

           Fellowship                                                            Belief, Invitation to Commitment

Contextualizing the Gospel.

Hunter III argues that in contrast to the Roman wing of the church, the Celts were gifted at contextualizing the gospel so that it made sense in terms of what already was significant within the culture. The following example may suffice.

 

The doctrine of the Trinity

This was part of the received tradition of Christian belief which easily lent itself to contextualization amongst the Celts. The Irish, perhaps from the teaching of the druids or the primal religion that preceded the druids, were aware that Ultimate Reality was mysterious and complex, and were comfortable with paradox.  They were also intrigued by numbers. Brendan Lehane notes that the number three was especially powerful, and that their characteristic way of structuring thought about complex matters was

the triad, an arrangement of three statements which summed up a thing or a person, a quality or mood, or simply linked otherwise incompatible things. Three false sisters were said to be ‘perhaps’, ‘maybe’ and ‘I dare say’: three timid brothers ‘Hush’, ‘Stop’ and ‘Listen.’ The three keys that unlock thoughts were drunkenness, trustfulness, love… If there were paradox or a pun in a triad, so much the better….the Irish had their liking for riddles too….Everyone was felt to be spiritually tied to three …lumps of earth, the three sods of fate. The first was that on which he was born, the sod of birth. Second was that on which he died. And the third marked the place of his burial.

 (Brendan Lehane, The Quest of Three Abbots:The Golden Age of Celtic Christianity)

Moreover, the Irish Celts even imagined some of their gods and (especially) goddesses in groups of three.  One god was believed to have three faces! Given such knowledge of the people and the culture, many missionaries would readily perceive that the Irish had been ‘shaped’ by history, by culture, and by preparatory grace to appreciate a Trinitarian explanation of God.  Thus when Irish seekers ask Patrick how Christinaity understands God, he withdraws, from the bank of Christian doctrine, the doctrine of the Trinity. The following summary expresses the significance of the Trinity for Celtic spirituality:

The doctrine of the Trinity became the foundational paradigm for Celtic Christianity. The doctrine informed the people’s piety as well as the theologians’ theories. The understanding of God as a unity of three persons, bound together in love, became the Celtic model for the Christian community; the understanding of God as a family of three persons defined the Christian family. Celtic Christians lived their daily lives, from waking up to cleaning up, from working to retiring, aware of the presence, protection, and guidance of all three persons of the Trinity.

Their understanding of the doctrine was like the Roman understanding, with two exceptions: First, Romans emphasised the oneness, or unity of the Trinity more than the Celts. Second, the Roman Christians emphasised the ‘transcendence’ of the Triune God (later expressed visibly in their Gothic cathedrals), and they seem to have experienced God as distant if not remote, except for Christ’s ‘real presence’ in the sacraments.  The Celtic Christians emphasised the ‘immanence’ of the Triune God as companion in this life and the next, in their experience the veil between earth and heaven was thin – creation was almost sacramental in itself.

Acknowlegment of Nature

Sometimes the Celtic mission context served not only as a theatre for adapting the presentation of Christianity; it also functioned as a catalyst for recovering something essential and precious within Christianity. The Celtic approach to nature was a very distinctive feature of Christianity, and also represented an important Christian recovery.

Potential Limitations of Celtic Christian Theology

What creates most unease about Celtic Christianity is their doctrine of human nature.  The Celtic Christians believed in the basic goodness of creation (even though infected by sin) and matched this by a belief in the essential goodness of human nature which one could appeal to in evangelism.  In this sense they were closer to the Greek church who believed that sin had neither obliterated the image of God nor destroyed the human capacity to seek God. Ian Bradley tells us that Celtic Christianity viewed ‘human nature not as being radically tainted by sin and evil, intrinsically corrupt and degenerate, but as imprinted with the image of God, full of potential and opportunity, longing for completion and perfection.’ (The Celtic Way)

The Roman church, influenced by Augustine, had a much less sanguine view of things. For Augustine,  Jesus Christ saves us by rescuing us from sin and the consequences of the Fall. For the Celtic apostles, Jesus Christ also comes to complete his good creation.  Arguably, Celtic Christianity’s theological optimism about human nature cannot account for something like the Holocaust whereas Augustine’s more pessimistic doctrine does make sense of large scale depravity.

What may be ultimately learned from the Celtic Christian Legacy?

1.    ‘Belong, believe, behave’ as the model for evangelism as opposed to ‘behave, believe, belong.’

2.    The re-integration of creation into theology and the Christian worldview.  Augustine saw creation as an evidence of God’s power, the Celtic Christians saw it as evidence of God’s love.

3.    The emerging postmodern culture is increasingly populated by ‘new Barbarians’ who are suspicious of institutions, authority and metanarratives but open to ‘spirituality.  The Celtic practices are a way to open up spirituality to these postmoderns.

4.    The use of the arts and creativity for church life, nurture and evangelism.

5.    The church as a place of hospitality and service.