Thomas E. McCollough - "Faith and Folly" (October 16, 1966)

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-	The church is under attack today.	0:23
	It's commonly criticized	0:27
	for failing to keep abreast of the times.	0:30
	But the fatal error of the institutional church in America	0:34
	is not that it has failed to adapt itself	0:40
	to the 20th century.	0:43
	It's sickness is that it has accepted with so few poems,	0:46
	the standards of the day.	0:52
	It may retain some of the antiquated language	0:54
	that echoes an earlier day.	0:58
	By that is itself a worldly wise strategy,	1:02
	since thereby the church is enabled to keep up appearances	1:09
	and pretend to be what it once was.	1:14
	Of course, most people have little inkling	1:18
	of what it once was, and probably care less.	1:20
	The trouble with the church is that it accord so well	1:25
	with the wisdom of the world.	1:29
	It knows how to get along, how to adjust,	1:33
	to conform, to succeed.	1:38
	It knows how to keep peace or talk peace,	1:43
	or at least protect itself from that	1:48
	which would disturb its own peace,	1:50
	even if it takes a role of deacon standing	1:54
	at the front of the church with folded arms.	1:56
	It's right at home in the modern world.	2:00
	No stranger, nor pilgrim,	2:03
	it is in touch with a contemporary situation.	2:06
	It cannot be said that it does not meet the needs	2:11
	of modern men since one of the great needs in this insecure	2:14
	and chaotic world is to be reassured on Sunday	2:20
	that our weekday values, morals,	2:26
	and way of life are basically sound	2:31
	and eminently worthy of being emulated by others,	2:35
	especially those who live in Southeast Asia.	2:40
	About the only real difference	2:45
	between what we hear throughout the week	2:47
	and what one is likely to hear on Sunday in church	2:50
	is the religious language and the pies inflection.	2:54
	Now is this heading, excuse me,	2:59
	that's not what I meant to say.	3:02
	I begin over.	3:05
	I'm sure it's not that.	3:07
	What I meant to say was is this petty	3:10
	or petulant carping criticism?	3:15
	No, I think not.	3:22
	It is the judgment on the church	3:23
	that is inescapable in the light	3:27
	of the source of the church, Jesus, the crucified.	3:31
	Jesus is unacceptable to the world today as revealer of God.	3:38
	Should this be so strange,	3:44
	or that the church should find him unacceptable as well?	3:47
	If he is a stumbling block	3:53
	and foolishness today as in the first century,	3:55
	it will not be now as it was not then	4:01
	because of purely intellectual difficulties.	4:05
	We're too adapted rationalizing not to be able	4:10
	to argue intelligently for any faith we may hold.	4:12
	It's rather because we cannot fit him into our way of life	4:18
	that we instinctively recoil from the word of the cross.	4:23
	Paul was not using his words carelessly	4:30
	when he spoke of Christ as the power of God	4:33
	and the wisdom of God.	4:37
	He saw the word of the cross as a challenge to the power	4:41
	and wisdom of his age.	4:44
	Our concepts of ideology	4:49
	and power structures correspond roughly, I think,	4:51
	to what Paul seems to mean by the wisdom of this age	4:56
	and the powers of this age.	4:59
	Paul's message was falling to modern Corinthian men	5:03
	because it matched the ideologist	5:06
	by which they lived not with a new ideology,	5:09
	but with a man on a cross.	5:14
	Paul's message was a stumbling block to modern men	5:17
	because it set this man over the power structures	5:20
	of religion and state.	5:26
	How could the spirit of the suffering servant done	5:30
	to death triumph over the powerful institutions	5:34
	or his message successfully compete	5:40
	with the prevailing worldviews?	5:42
	The ideologies were ways of looking at reality	5:45
	that did not allow for a cross as a key	5:53
	to understanding the meaning of life.	5:56
	The power structures were ways of preserving	6:01
	and defending interests which might be endangered,	6:05
	where concerned for persons given priority.	6:10
	The challenge of Jesus mode of life was radical	6:16
	because he refused to meet the world on its own terms,	6:19
	with its own weapons.	6:24
	He inaugurated a permanent revolution	6:28
	when you set the person over institution and ideology.	6:30
	And pressed the challenge home	6:35
	in the most radical way conceivable	6:37
	by means neither of power, nor of wisdom,	6:41
	but only by the power of love itself.	6:48
	This Paul says is a foolishness	6:54
	and the weakness of God.	6:57
	It contrasts sharply with the wisdom	7:01
	and the power of the world.	7:04
	Its symbol is the cross.	7:07
	In giving himself for persons,	7:10
	God reveal what it means to be human.	7:13
	And saw the acceptance of the cross enables a man	7:17
	to relinquish every claim on life.	7:20
	Every possession,	7:24
	every security to give himself as a human being caring	7:26
	for other human beings.	7:31
	The ultimate freedom is disclosed as the love that is steady	7:34
	and persistent to the end.	7:39
	The self-giving love that culminated in the cross	7:42
	can hardly be an optional quality	7:46
	which can be added to or subtracted from the human	7:49
	if one sees this love as the love of very God himself,	7:54
	woven into the texture of human existence.	8:01
	But though this be the truly human quality of life,	8:07
	it's reality to be sure eludes us much of the time.	8:12
	The vision of the life of love is sustained in faith	8:19
	and faith is sustained by God.	8:25
	And so Paul declares to the Corinthians	8:29
	that your faith might not rest in the wisdom of men,	8:31
	but in the power of God.	8:35
	But we're bound to say that may sound good,	8:39
	but it's not a realistic solution to the world's problems.	8:43
	We argue that it may have been relevant	8:48
	to men in pre-industrial society,	8:50
	but in a day of rapid technological and social change,	8:53
	talk about loving persons, loving concern for persons.	8:56
	This kind of talk is beside the point, we may say.	9:02
	The scope of one to one relations is too limited	9:08
	to be a significance in this revolutionary world, we say.	9:11
	An outstanding Christian thinker in America has	9:16
	for a generation warned us against trying	9:20
	to apply the personal morality	9:23
	of love based on the teachings of Jesus	9:25
	to society as a whole.	9:28
	But however salutary this warning may have been in the past	9:31
	as a corrective of religious sentimentalism,	9:35
	it may not be the word for the crisis	9:39
	in which we find ourselves.	9:41
	The folly of faith may be the price of survival	9:45
	for individuals trying to make sense of life,	9:49
	for families attempting to find a bond beyond blood,	9:52
	for cities facing slums, rives and apathy,	9:56
	for a nation seeking an identity,	10:00
	and for a world trying to keep from exploding.	10:03
	Could it be that the folly	10:07
	of love is the only realistic answer	10:08
	to the folly of the world's wisdom?	10:12
	But how can the one-to-one relation be effective	10:16
	against the power structures and ideologies of our day?	10:20
	Consider our justification	10:27
	of our role in the conflict in Vietnam.	10:29
	One of our ex-presidents has reasonably said	10:33
	that when a nation is committed to force,	10:35
	there is no higher court of appeal.	10:37
	"You've got to win," he declared.	10:40
	And subsequently said	10:43
	that he would not rule out the use of nuclear weapons.	10:44
	Americans can hear this without moral outrage	10:48
	because they assume first that we're morally right,	10:51
	and second, that we are justified in using all	10:54
	of the mighty at our disposal	10:56
	to enforce our idea of the right.	10:58
	The ancient word quoted	11:01
	by Paul may resound ominously in our ears;	11:02
	I will destroy the wisdom of the wise.	11:06
	The secretary of defense has just returned	11:10
	from Vietnam reporting impressive success	11:12
	in our efforts there with one exception,	11:15
	the rural aid program of pacification	11:19
	is a disappointing failure.	11:21
	We are succeeding in killing people very effectively,	11:24
	but it seems are not very persuasive	11:27
	with those who manage to stay alive.	11:29
	In our concern to counter aggression	11:33
	with superior military might,	11:35
	we're in danger of sacrificing persons	11:37
	to ideological principles.	11:39
	This isn't the occasion for a review of Vietnam policy,	11:42
	but our ancient text and that's one good thing,	11:48
	may I say in defense of the Bible for ancient texts.	11:53
	Our ancient texts has a disquieting power	11:56
	to call in question the wisdom of the world,	12:00
	including our own ideology	12:02
	by which we rationalize our military presence	12:05
	in Southeast Asia.	12:08
	We cannot create by coercion whether one world,	12:11
	one nation, one city, one family, or one life.	12:18
	Force can be used to restrain evildoers	12:27
	and even to annihilate them,	12:30
	but it cannot revivify, heal, build up,	12:34
	forge human bonds of understanding compassion	12:40
	and the will to find common ground	12:43
	on which to live together.	12:45
	Only love can do that.	12:48
	Realistic love like that of Martin Luther King,	12:51
	who this week endorsed a statement	12:53
	by seven national Negro leaders,	12:55
	repudiating what we know now is under the cry of black power	12:57
	and affirming integration as a goal.	13:03
	Non-violence as the method.	13:05
	But King went on to say,	13:09
	"It is not the Negro who is on trial,	13:11
	"but white society because it alone has power."	13:15
	In fact, he said,	13:20
	"Power is a reaction to the abusive.	13:21
	"Black power is a reaction	13:24
	"to the abusers of white power."	13:26
	It is true that power is a reality.	13:30
	It will not be wished away.	13:34
	By the hopeless society lies in the equitable use of power	13:37
	as the instrument of love.	13:42
	Martin Luther King at this moment in history,	13:45
	well symbolizes that wisdom and power which seem weak,	13:48
	but will if anything can	13:53
	effect a nonviolent revolution in justice	13:56
	and human freedom.	13:59
	This love must not be confused with sentimental idealism.	14:03
	The revolutionary spirit of our age demands	14:09
	and in pins to see the power structures	14:13
	of entrenched privilege and social injustice torn down.	14:18
	Power is being challenged with power.	14:25
	What can love do in the social struggles of our day	14:29
	that erupt in bloody strife?	14:32
	It can insist on opening doors between the ends	14:35
	and the outs.	14:40
	It can create the will to work together between those	14:42
	who struggled to maintain the power structures,	14:45
	protecting their way of life,	14:48
	and those who counter the violence of the status quo	14:51
	with force in the attempt to secure long denied rights.	14:54
	Love can create and maintain the will	15:00
	to talk together rather than to fight it out.	15:04
	It can take the initiative	15:08
	in acknowledging one's own wrongs,	15:09
	and in forgiving the wrongs of the other.	15:11
	It can also refuse to be ignored by those who confuse love	15:14
	with passive acquiescence to established injustice.	15:18
	The word of the cross proclaims the power of love.	15:22
	But love is powerful only when it shows itself able	15:27
	to persist in spite of all that is done to it.	15:29
	If it is able to suffer,	15:35
	it is enabled to hope, but not otherwise	15:37
	for the power of the world is well-established	15:43
	and is amply justified by the ideologies of the world.	15:46
	Let us use every means at our disposal	15:54
	to bring about the social changes needed.	15:56
	If people are to live as human beings with dignity	16:00
	and self-respect,	16:03
	we can be grateful for the concern of so many people	16:05
	and groups for our social betterment.	16:08
	For the fact that the American people are beginning	16:12
	to accept responsibility for using the instruments of local	16:14
	and federal agencies to effect institutional change.	16:18
	But let us not think that this is all that needs to be done,	16:22
	for even in the midst of affluence,	16:27
	there are people who are isolated and estranged	16:30
	to say nothing of the many in our society who are bewildered	16:34
	to find themselves being catapulted from degrading,	16:38
	but familiar surroundings into improved,	16:42
	but strange conditions where they may begin	16:45
	to see themselves in a new light.	16:49
	Caring persons are needed	16:52
	to help them understand themselves in a new way.	16:55
	Those of you who are involved in the tutoring programs	16:59
	could speak of the significance	17:04
	of this one to one relationship	17:05
	for the real value that is created	17:09
	is not primarily the knowledge that is imparted	17:10
	from tutor to pupil,	17:13
	but by the fact that someone cares	17:16
	and believes in the youngster.	17:18
	Though sometimes it has to be a one to two relationship	17:22
	because there are not enough tutors to go around.	17:26
	Some of you who've worked this past summer in Durham,	17:32
	came to know children from large families	17:34
	who live in cramped quarters	17:39
	and which the parents have little energy or thought	17:43
	for the child as an individual.	17:46
	Because of this,	17:49
	the child does not develop feelings for himself as a person.	17:50
	The program had started has equipped some classrooms	17:55
	with full length mirrors because it was learned	17:59
	that some of the children had no idea what they looked like	18:02
	having never seen themselves in a mirror.	18:05
	Young men and women are acting as mirrors themselves.	18:09
	Reflecting an image of the child back to him	18:14
	that is reassuring and strengthening.	18:18
	Because he is accepted as a person in his own right	18:22
	with needs and possibilities and worth,	18:25
	the child can begin	18:29
	to assimilate a positive image of himself.	18:30
	The value of this kind	18:36
	of relationship is born out in other programs.	18:37
	Recently it was reported that because of the shortage	18:40
	of trained personnel in state mental hospitals,	18:43
	it was decided to bring in lay people to help	18:46
	with some of the patients on the wards.	18:49
	It was discovered that remarkable things were taking place	18:52
	in the patients that could be attributed largely	18:55
	to the relationship established	18:57
	by the caring persons who visited them, took them for walks	19:00
	and communicated warm and acceptance.	19:05
	Housewives who were untrained,	19:09
	serving part-time on a volunteer basis,	19:12
	we're able to affect dramatic changes	19:15
	in deeply disturbed persons.	19:18
	And here's a clipping from the Nigerian outlook,	19:22
	June 8th, 1966,	19:25
	telling of the shooting of Mr. James Meredith.	19:28
	It comes from a duke graduate	19:31
	serving there in the peace corps.	19:32
	Young men and women around the world are finding	19:34
	that in this turbulent moment of history,	19:36
	the one-to-one relation of a caring person	19:39
	to another becomes a creative	19:42
	and redemptive force in spite of cultural barriers.	19:45
	A black man is attacked by whites in Mississippi.	19:50
	The story is reported in Nigeria	19:53
	and relayed back by a white man in the peace corps.	19:57
	So are we interrelated in a world	20:00
	that may increasingly recognize the influence	20:04
	of persons on the events and movements of the day.	20:07
	I began by taking note of the criticisms	20:13
	of the institutional church.	20:16
	But the church is most radically judged in light	20:19
	of the event which produced it.	20:23
	Whatever the weaknesses, errors, inadequacy,	20:26
	or a sickness of the church, it stands judged,	20:29
	not on the basis of modern ideas,	20:34
	but of the figure on the cross.	20:37
	But it may also be renewed from its source	20:39
	and it can scarcely be written off all together	20:43
	when within its ranks are counted those	20:47
	who persist in taking with life and death seriousness.	20:50
	The imperative of love and reconciliation.	20:54
	For there are those within and outside	21:00
	who choose in the insecurity of faith	21:05
	and the risk of love to live out their lives in the spirit	21:09
	of the suffering servant.	21:14
	They discover that the weakness	21:17
	and foolishness of love become the power	21:21
	and the wisdom of God.	21:28
	And now may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ,	21:43
	the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be	21:47
	with us now and evermore, amen.	21:53
	(lively hymn)	22:03

Item Info

Title:

Thomas E. McCollough - "Faith and Folly" (October 16, 1966)

Permalink:

https://idn.duke.edu/ark:/87924/r44f1rk2v

Date:

October 16, 1966

Speaker:

McCollough, Thomas E.

Contributor:

Duke University. Chapel

Identifier:

UA.17.01.0003 RR-0357
ref5917_kul
uachapelsermaud
duke:627997
dcrau002353
ark:/87924/r44f1rk2v
b9aa2371-7f26-4715-8d64-e2650f11116c

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Duke Chapel Recordings

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Duke University Chapel recordings

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English

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United States
North Carolina
Durham (N.C.)

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The Duke University Chapel Recordings were transferred to the Duke University Archives beginning in 1970.

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Thomas E. McCollough - "Faith and Folly" (October 16, 1966)

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