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Army walking a spiritual tightrope

Army walking a spiritual tightrope

Army walking a spiritual tightrope

11 May 2016

By Lieutenant-Colonel Neil Young

Some time ago I found it necessary to worship outside The Salvation Army. This had one main advantage in that it gave me time to take an objective look at our Army and to assess its condition.

It also gave me an opportunity to study other theologies through Booth College. I still firmly believe that the Army's theology, and its mandate, is from God, keeping in balance our love for God and our love for our neighbour.
Churches suffered a great loss of membership and attendance following World War I; for sociological reasons and changing world views in the intellectual and scientific reasonings of the time. The church was not seen as viable “home” and it became just an attachment for many people.

The Army was not immune.

One of the greatest Methodists since John Wesley’s time was the very influential W.E. Sangster. (Phoebe Palmer, an American, was another and earned the name of “the mother of the entire sanctification movement”. She had a great influence on Salvation Army founders William and Catherine Booth).

Sangster was deeply concerned about the serious decline of Methodism and to address this he wrote a book under the title “Methodism Can be Born Again”, with the subtitle “To the people called Methodists, with much affection and warm gratitude but in great concern”.

The book, which goes into detail revealing the tragic loss of membership and its spiritual influence, appeared in 1938, coinciding with the bi-centenary of John Wesley’s Aldersgate conversion.

Unfortunately, the Methodist Church (followed by the Uniting Church) has never in the past 80 years been born again and restored to its former spiritual glory. Methodists admit that.

Spiritual decline

Now allow me to digress a little.

A nephew of mine is a very wealthy entrepreneur, while at the same time an authoritative figure in the Baptist Church in Melbourne. He is an associate of World Vision CEO Tim Costello, who would be one of Australia’s most influential churchmen.

After my eldest brother’s funeral I met John and we had some serious conversation. He said he thought that the Army would never die in Australia because Australians needed the Army, if only to salve their own consciences in doing something about Australia’s social needs. That was comforting to hear from a well-informed Australian who is a leading voice on social justice issues.

But his second question was disturbing. He asked, “How well does the Army balance its twin Christian requirement to love God and our neighbour?”  My short reply was, “With great difficulty”. I did not want to discuss this with him.

Now, as I see the Methodist church from my academic studies and my reading, the same problem faced this once great church.
The Methodist (Uniting) Church has one of the greatest social/welfare networks in the country. In my little town, it has two senior nursing homes, Blue Care, Lifeline and a host of other facilities. This Australian church must have the most comprehensive programme of welfare facilities in the country.

Yet its church membership and attendance and its spirituality has not made the same progress. It is interesting to note that Sangster’s book is about spiritual renewal and has nothing to say about welfare at all.

It seems to me that the balance between spiritual and welfare emphasis has, in this denomination, been lost, and as far as I can see there is no prophet in this church to bring back this balance.

Sociologists say that the depth of spirituality throughout the world's history has had a variety of ups and downs. Some Christian leaders believe that real spirituality will make a comeback. But the last return to New Testament spirituality was more than 200 years ago in John Wesley’s time.

There have been some minor revivals, including The Salvation Army, but that has not been strong enough to change the thinking and religious fervour  of the world.

Have we gone the way of the Methodists and, more importantly, are we still leaning in that direction?
We have to admit that this is not our intention and we are constantly reminding ourselves that “all my work is for the Master?”

Disturbing imbalance

General Albert Orsborn (1886-1967) was a powerful influence in trying to get us back to the basic motivation for our social  work. General John Gowans (1934-2012) also did the Army a great service in this area.

There are pockets where spiritual revival is evident but if you take a look at the imbalance between the number of retirements and resignations of Salvation Army officers against those coming into officership we are seriously not growing. We are not replacing those who are no longer active in our movement. This has to be seen as serious.

Also, it is sadly true that we do lose a lot of deeply spiritual people because of the weakness of our internal spiritual weakness and poverty, in spite of the fact that we are the most highly thought of welfare movement in Australia.

We do not undertake welfare projects for the sake of our own acceptability and profile within the community. We undertake them as fulfilling the second of the great commandments. 

We need to look at this seriously if we hope to have a return to the divinely appointed balance. Maybe we could emphasise this by decreasing our social work so that  our energies could be diverted back to the spiritual.

Lieut-Colonel Neil Young is a retired officer of The Salvation Army.

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