Blight in the Vineyard, and Clergy Sex Abuse: Some Initial Thoughts Provoked by John Immel’s Book

Paul's Passing Thoughts
March 29, 2012

http://paulspassingthoughts.wordpress.com/2012/03/27/blight-in-the-vineyard-and-clergy-sex-abuse-some-initial-thoughts-provoked-by-john-immels-book/

I am presently reading, “Blight in the Vineyard” by John Immel. One should probably read this book a couple of times before they review it (this isn’t the formal review), but my present understanding of the book has provoked some thoughts that are perhaps worth writing about. That’s because the book is very thought provoking. The subtitle is, “Exposing the Roots, Myths, and Emotional Torment of Spiritual Tyranny.”

Let’s face it: spiritual abuse; clergy sexual abuse; clergy manipulation; clergy intimidation; clergy control mania, and everyday spiritual tyranny is rampant in today’s church. Without hardly any effort at all I compiled the blogroll under “Abuse” in this website’s sidebar.

What’s going on? Obviously, something is. And John Immel offers a thesis concerning the root cause in his book. That’s important—endless discussions concerning symptoms will leave us all dressed up with nowhere to go. Immel outlines the historic philosophies that have led to the present spiritual tyranny of our day. And spiritual tyranny often comes with the unspoken clergy perk of selected concubines. Willing and unwilling. That’s my angle here; one of the symptoms of spiritual tyranny.

Immel, in the book, also mentions his own unfortunate collision with the descendants of spiritual despots; such collisions drive some to relentlessly pursue the reasons that this tyranny takes place. Immel was helped in this endeavor by his vast education in church history. My story is the same. What is behind the outrageous behavior of a whole generation of spiritual leaders? And how can their mode of operation be so similar? I also had to know. I even went back to college to get the tools that I needed for the mission. Others who have approached this problem from different angles are finding uncanny agreement with each other on common points.

More of Immel’s book must be absorbed, but for the purpose of this post, I will present a really rough sketch. It all starts with a predominate ancient philosophy that propagated the supposed inability of man to know reality. Therefore, mankind is in need of those who are spiritually enlightened to guide us. This philosophy eventually entered the church under the auspices of total depravity. In fact, man is so totally depraved, that the church enlisted the help of government to keep the totally depraved in line. The governing authorities are often all too happy to cooperate as a way to control the masses with a central belief system. This meant making the Scriptures property of the state with the clergy wing being the only ones who could supposedly interpret them. Daring to interpret the Scriptures for yourself could get you burned at the stake—if you were lucky:

I do further promise and declare that I will, when opportunity presents, making and wage relentless war, secretly or openly, against all heretics, Protestants and liberals, as I am directed to do and to extirpate and exterminate them from the face of the whole earth; and that I will spare neither sex, age or condition; and that I will hang, waste, boil, flay, strangle and bury alive these infamous heretics; rip up the stomachs and wombs of their women and crush their infants’ heads against the wall, in order to annihilate forever their execrable race.

~Pope Paul III, 1576

The Reformation was probably just as much about freedom of thought as it was anything moral or theological. When Papal authority was brought down, a vast verity of religious thought transpired. When the Reformers attempted to bring some theological order back to the masses, they employed the same kind of philosophy and heavy handed control as the popes had. In fact, Calvin also coveted with the government of Geneva and had his share of heretics burned and beheaded. Meanwhile, throughout history, the Catholic Church has continued to treat parishioners as little more than cattle to be herded about and feasted on. As recent as 1948, horrific atrocities by the Catholic Church have been recorded in books such as, “House of Death and Gate of Hell.”

In his book, Immel seems to think that this authoritative control of knowledge (which both the Catholic Church and the Reformers were/are guilty of) ends up being the decrees of men instead of absolute truth. Creeds, accords, confessions, catechisms, and counsels become the authority, and the nomenclature is “orthodoxy.” That’s a word I use often myself.

Think what you will of Immel’s thesis (as well as I have stated it here), but frankly, I see the reality of it everywhere in today’s Christian landscape. Clergy does what it damn well pleases, while the laity is kept in line. And especially in Reformed circles, creeds and confessions are the authority. This has always baffled me, but apparently, this is a mentality that has been present throughout the history of the church.

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Except in the Bible. Again, one of Immel’s minor theses’ in the book is the idea that orthodoxy and absolute truth are two separate things—orthodoxy is most often the decrees of men used for ill purpose. And hark; we see that plainly in our day. The Bible calls for pastors that sin to be rebuked before all so that the others will fear (1Timothy 5:20). That’s absolute truth, and in other expressions, especially contemporary ones, would be a data base to warn other churches about spiritually enlightened pedophiles (which to date no denomination has agreed to do). Instead, orthodoxy in most of these situations has yielded tragic results by using biblical facts to distort absolute truth.

I’m just sayin’ seems like Immel is on to something.