The Subversive Church, Part One

I have thought to myself, before joining the blog craze, that I would someday write a book about the Subversive Church. It's been an idea bouncing around in my head for at least a year now - and believe me, there's lots of room in there to bounce.

It started in a discussion I was having over William Cavanaugh's excellent exploration of liberation theology in Pinochet's Chile, Torture and Eucharist. The problem I have always had with liberation theology is that, whatever its quasi-biblical basis, its means and ends are always entirely political. As though salvation can be achieved by overthrowing an oppressor. As though salvation of a people or nation or community, as opposed to an individual believer, has any meaning.

And yet Cavanaugh makes an excellent point in his study of the Roman Catholic church in Chile, and its response to the brutality of the Pinochet regime. The local church tried for years to remain aloof of local politics, asserting time and again that its concern was for the spiritual welfare of its parishioners, that it could not become entangled in political, or even worse, revolutionary struggle. Yet to remain aloof required the church to stand by while its members and certain other "undesirables" of its community were beaten, tortured and killed.

It was easy at first for me to make the case that the biblical demand is that, yes, we stay out of politics in the church, even at the cost of our lives. But the memory of Nazi Germany gave me pause. I have wondered many times how the church in Germany could stand by silently while Hitler exterminated millions of innocents, even continuing to baptize and administer ordinances to Hitler's army. Their silence was worse than neutral - it was complicit, perhaps even cowardly. The church in Germany should have done something. But what?

I found Cavanaugh's account of Chile to give part of the answer. Subversion. The church is not (or should not be) a political body - it can't meet the government head on. But it can follow its own agenda, not by fighting the policies of the oppressive regime, but by ignoring them. When Pinochet's men tortured someone, the church provided sanctuary and free medical care. When the church learned of a torture facility, they sent people to stand outside with signs that read, "Torture is being done here." They wrote letters, took video, publicized the whole thing. They did not fight Pinochet's regime, they subverted it. They determined to minister to the people in the very teeth of tyranny.

Interestingly, the local diocese in Chile received opposition to its efforts not only from Pinochet, but also from Rome. To be true to its calling to "be Christ" to the local community, the church in Chile was forced into a subversive role toward not only the secular power of its government, but also the religious authority of its denomination. They did not openly oppose the rulings handed down from Rome, but found ways to minister with integrity despite them.


The key to my understanding of what motivated the local church in Chile to flout both secular and religious authority in order to serve its community is integrity. The individual men and women in Chile who made that decision were bound to obey not Pinochet, and not the Pope, but Jesus Christ. They made a collective decision to subvert their organizational authority in the name of Christ.

I know, this is dangerous talk. But it's one with a long and glorious tradition in the history of the Church. How, I wonder, does the idea of subversion apply to our current situation in the Baptist church?