Augustine and Politics!

After having spent way too much time in seminary, anytime i see an early church father mentioned in a non-christian publication, it catches my attention. After all why else would someone quote Origen or in this case Augustine?! Of course given the american educational system, its amazing that any classical western philosophers or philosophers form anywhere int he world enter into the public debate. So when i came upon this essay by Stanley Fish i was amazed and then i sat down to digest...

Like many americans, i have been passively observing the soap opera that is Gov. Rod Blagojevich and his open senate seat. On the one hand, the governor with his wanna be "Donald Trump hair do" is quite amusing to watch. He's kind of the Al Davis of the political world. In complete and total denial and yet has way to much time and money to do anything constructive with it. His pick of Burris...genius. Talk about throwing a monkey wrench into the works and really pissing a bunch of people off. PBS news has been very entertaining of late!

Now here i have a confession to make, i don't remember anything of Augustine's theology. I vaguely remember studying the Donatist controversy. I know i read this stuff, wrote papers on it, but yup, dont remember it. Some of the problem is that i'm more interested in the historical stuff, not the actual details of the theology. Luckily Stanley Fish gives a nice refresher in his essay! Well that and i have books and google! (here's a nice review of Augustines life and times)

Upon my brief review of the controversy, it got me thinking about leadership in the church. (oh no!) It seems that recently, those of us in the non-liturgical, low church traditions with American culture have moved towards picking leaders based upon their personality, theology and also character(i hope!). Now this isn't necessarily a bad thing, after all Paul must've been a pretty dynamic guy. And what church wouldn't want that for their leadership?! But, if that person fails us, then we tend to not only dismiss the person, but the whole institution. The underlying conceit is that if the institution can't choose the best person, then the institution is flawed. This means that we take a position contrary to Augustine. We basically dont respect the position, whether it be priest or pastor, as being a representatative of the church, who's head is Jesus Christ. We want our church leadership to be full of saints, not humans trying their best to serve and represent God on this frail planet. The pressure to be a saint is burning out our clergy...

The recent trend of denominations to send their leaders to psychological testing and reviews isn't necessarily a bad thing. But what if God is calling someone into a position of leadership who may have some psychological issues, like addiction, or a mental illness. Another troubling thought comes to mind, "Should we pick leaders who are a good match for the church?" Or "Should we pick leaders who would be good for the church?" and "How do we know who God has determined to be the leader of the church?"

So maybe we should look into new models of leadership? Or maybe revisit the old models and adapt them to our 21st century context. In looking at different churches, i've noticed that in low churches there is a tendency towards personality cults. While high churches can sometimes place people into churches where they are a poor fit. The question is how do we find the balance? Hmm something new to ponder in the coming year...