440 -Gods of Goodness

Gods of Goodness
By Bruce L. Blackie
Philadelphia, Westminster Press, 1975. 170 pp. $5.95.

Ever since Gibson Winter wrote The Suburban Captivity of the Churches in 1961, the parish church has been singled out as the place where civil religion and acculturated Christianity are in command. Winter's book marked a watershed from the 1950's to the 1960's and furnished much needed insights into the way the church of the mid-twentieth century had evolved. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said for the spate of books that have followed-partly because some of them are superficial echoes and surely because the religion and cultural climate of the mid-1970's are so vastly different from that of the mid- 1960's.

Now, more than a dozen years after the onslaught, "mainline" or "mainstream" Protestantism finds itself in disarray, suffering from a "paralysis from analysis" and a crisis in belief, the combination having issued in a lack of nerve. So it is something of a surprise to find a newly published book which dutifully goes over the old terrain all over again. It differs from most of its predecessors in that its attack is not so much sociological as it is theological. Soon, however, someone must view the parish church in the light of its authenticity as a valid expression of Protestant Christianity. We need to ask, as did Richard Niebuhr a generation ago in Christ and Culture, where our concern with relevance must be seen as part of the larger question-how Christians can express their uniqueness within a pluralistic culture and at the same time function within that culture as agents of the grace of God.

441 -Gods of Goodness

To all of this Bruce Blackie agrees, but his book spends most of its time reciting the terribly familiar Litany on the Woes of the Parish Church. All the clichés and stereotypes are here. It would not be hard for the reader to get the feeling that the parish church is not a very pleasant place to be and that the office of the ordained ministry is a terrible drag-an impression that simply cannot be shared by a multitude of pastors and congregations where biblical integrity, theological vitality, and cultural awareness abound.

The author describes two kinds of "idols" that have taken possession of the church, idols of the mind and idols of culture. A lack of understanding of the Bible because of an overemphasis on "reason" is an example of the former. An obsession with achievement and activism, a misunderstanding of "goodness," and a failure to grasp the meaning of the church and its forms of worship through the centuries are other examples of "idols of the mind." When the author writes of the "idols of culture," he deals with the idolatry that captivates and corrupts many persons in the various forms of the encounter movement with a chapter titled "Freedom without Truth." Then he attacks the organizational idol under the heading, "Truth without Freedom."

In the preface the author declares, "However negative these observations may appear, the thrust of this book is positive," but it actually comes across as one more recitation on the acculturated Christianity of the late twentieth century. What is needed is a strong affirmation of the reality of the grace of God which makes us "fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone" (Ephesians 2:19-20). Then the superficiality of our obsession with "gods of goodness" will be seen for what it is. The church has been able to deal with the idols that the author describes when it has had a clear commitment to its purpose as understood in the kerygma, the didache, the koinonia, and the diaconia. There is every reason to think that the author believes this too, but his book lays emphasis on the gimmicks of the little gods rather than on the grace of God.

David B. Watermulder
Bryn Mawr Presbyterian Church
Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania