Engaging the Bible in Mission Theology
Scholarship: Mission Practice as Moral
Craft
Introduction
Following Aristotle (Nichomachian Ethics), ethics might be thought of in terms of a
craft (te,cnh) practised by a guild. This notion
highlights the roles of ends, virtues, tradition, community, friendship, apprenticeship,
and practices in ethics. To this idea of
moral craft has been added (particularly starting in the 1970s through Stanley
Hauerwas’s work) the important notion in ethics of ‘narrative’—the story-formed
identity of a community. This brief
essay offers an application of these ideas to mission practice in an outline
form for further discussion and reflection.
By seeing mission practice through the lenses of ‘moral craft’, the hope
is that the field of ethics will contribute something to mission studies. Some suggestions for discussion are offered for
each of the points briefly introduced in the following essay.
1. Ends. We need ends or goals (te,loj) to guide
our actions. (Craftsmen need to remember
that, e.g., they are making cheese, not yoghurt.) For ethics, the end needs to be the highest
good, for it must give meaning to all other ends. Aristotle spoke of this highest good as
'pleasure'; the Westminster Catechism as 'to glorify God and enjoy Him
forever'. A narrative ethic might phrase
the chief end in terms of 'faithful living within the narrative by which we
live' (as opposed to effectiveness, e.g.).
Jesus' answer to the question of the highest good was in terms of 'love
of God and neighbour' (Mt. 22.37-40).
One way of expanding the idea of 'end' in ethics is to speak of 'moral vision' (so Richard Hays)--the
way we see the world through our unique, story-formed community and tradition.
*If development
work has the end of 'caring', or 'self-empowerment to meet basic needs', how
will this relate to an ethic for development work? Will a 'highest end' (to glorify God?) guide
these ends as well, or will development work not include spiritual life?
*What assumed
moral ends operate in development work?
(Often Western development work assumes these are human rights, freedom,
self-determination, equality.)
2. Virtues. A craft involves certain virtues. 'avreth,' (virtue) means 'that quality of a
thing which helps it accomplish its purpose (end) well.' If we are making knives, the virtues of the
knife might be: sharpness, a good weight, good grip, the right blade for the
right task (serrated or not), price.
Aristotle defines a virtue as the mean between two extremes (deficiency
and excess, which are vices). These
virtues define a thing's character (h;qoj). The practice of the craft also involves
certain virtues: virtues associated with a business ethic and work ethic.
*How do our
Christian stories and overall narrative define the virtues of our mission
practice (e.g., the cross of Jesus Christ defines Paul’s understanding of his
own suffering and service).
*What 'common
virtues' apply to all involved in a certain practice? (E.g., Communication practice: accuracy,
truthfulness, clarity, conciseness, balance, relevance, interesting, etc.) What about Development practices? Evangelistic practices?
*What 'specific
virtues' apply to Christian mission practice?
Development work?
*How will ethics
understood as development of character
within a given tradition and community be different from ethics understood in
terms of making decisions? (Decisionism: Deontological, Teleological/
Consequentialist, Situationist ethics)
*What individual
virtues apply to Christians? Paul speaks
of 'gifts' rather than virtues, implying (a) human fallenness requires God's
grace and (b) human virtue requires God's grace.
*How should we
rank the virtues (which are primary and which secondary; e.g., in 1
Corinthians, Paul explains what a difference it makes if we prioritize freedom
over love)?
3. Tradition. Different crafts have different ends, values,
virtues, obligations, rules, actions, etc.
There are even secrets kept by craftsmen for how they make their craft
(hence the title 'mister' [mystery] for a craftsman). Similarly, many ethicists argue, ethics is
not universal but from within a certain tradition (cf. Alisdair
MacIntyre). Ethics is not first a
question of what we should do but of who we should be as members of this
community, with these determinative stories and authorities, practices, etc. This different way of doing ethics opens up
new ways to speak about the use of Biblical authority for Christian tradition:
emphasis is placed not simply on rules for what we should do but on how
Scripture defines our tradition and community (uses of Scripture: rules,
principles, paradigms and narratives, and worldview). E.g., narrative ethics emphasises the
relation between the story-formed tradition and the ethic that derives from
within that tradition. E.g., debates
about 'abortion' in America involve women's rights, since the American
narrative is one about freedom and equality.
In communist countries, individual rights were eclipsed by community
needs, and so abortion has to do with what will contribute to the work force,
the community, the country. In China,
abortion also has to do with concerns about over population and the desire to
have male children. Each of these
examples leads to a defense of abortion, but for very different reasons based
on very different traditions within history and society. Christian tradition defended the life of the
unborn because it viewed life as God-given, and the early Church opposed all
forms of killing (soldiering, serving as magistrates who could sentence people
to death, abortion, infanticide).
So, e.g., we might ask if the Christian
tradition informs Christian practices in communication:
* Reporting is not
only reporting news; it is uncovering a tradition's assumed narrative and
understanding how its virtues operate within that narrative and tradition. Christian reporting will uncover the assumed
tradition of society and challenge this with Christian tradition.
*How will being a
member of a Christian community guide one to pursue certain stories/information
and not others? Tradition establishes
agenda for inquiry.
*How will being a
member of a Christian community guide one to communicate material a certain
way?
What about Christian development practice?
4. Community.
Even the same craft might be practised differently by different guilds. 'This is how we do things here.' Ethics involves being shaped by and for a
given community. Aristotle's Nichomachean Ethics (cf. Plato's Republic) prepares people to live within
the Greek city state; his virtues are those befitting such a society (they are
not ‘absolute’ virtues fit for every society on earth).
*What does it mean
to practice Christian development work within a Christian community, and how
does development work with its virtues play a role in larger society?
*What does it mean
to practice development work as a member of a Christian community while living
in larger society? H. Richard Niebuhr (Christ and Culture) spoke of five models
for the relation of Church and culture: Christ against culture, Christ of
culture, Christ and culture in paradox, Christ over culture, and Christ
transforming culture. What socio-political
and theological factors come into play to direct our Christian involvement in
society?
*What does it mean
to practice one's craft within a guild/community? Paul speaks of different gifts within the
community, and seeking the good of the church community in practising one's
gifts (1 Cor. 12-14). Stanley Hauerwas
says that the Church does not have a
social ethic, it is a social
ethic. Many Christian ethicists like to
speak of Kingdom ethics to capture the socio-political nature of Christian
ethics (over against simply a personal ethic).
In such ways, the conversation about the relationship between community
and ethics (including our practices, such as missions) has developed.
5. Friendship. Aristotle discusses ethics primarily in terms
of 'virtues' (books 2 - 7) and 'friendship' (books 8 - 9). (Friendship is another aspect of life in
community, and so it is mentioned here.
As an approach to ethics, it overlaps with a virtue ethic.) Aristotle discusses three types of
friendship: friendship for utility, pleasure, and of good people. Virtue and friendship are related in the last
instance of friendship: 'complete friendship is the friendship of good people
similar in virtue' (NE, 9.35). Aristotle also discusses friendship in
families (cf. the NT's household codes).
Obligation derives from the
friendships (relationships) we have.
Components
of friendship (Aristotle): (1) doing things for the
other's good (goodwill, concord, active and unselfish benevolence, self-love
[loving a friend who is most a friend, a basis for making costly sacrifices for
others]; (2) wishing the friend to be and live for his/her own sake; (3)
spending time together; (4) making the same choices; (5) sharing in each
other's distress and enjoyment (NE,
11.11). Cf. Rom. 12.1-18; John 13-17.
*Some cultures
emphasise friendship as a basis for relationships of all sorts: political
leaders are 'benefactors' and parent figures; contracts are more oral than
written and friendship is the basis of the relationship more than legal
documents; tipping and bribery are aspects of relationships (gone wrong!) rather
than legality.
*How does mission
practice relate to 'friendship' and 'community' with respect to the church and
society as a whole?
*What significance
did Paul’s team approach to missions play in early Christian missions—and what
role should it play today (often individuals are sent out as missionaries on
their own; often the focus is on a task or project—what difference would it
make to focus the emphasis on developing Christian friendship in the practice
of missions and as the result of missions (=planting healthy church
communities)?
6. Apprenticeship. Those being initiated into a craft undergo an
apprenticeship. There is a need for a teacher or mentor. Apprentices need
models of good craftsmen and crafstmenship.
Apprentices learn to order their desires, develop the character
befitting the task, practices that lead to high quality, etc. The shaping of one's character (h;qoj) entails developing the right virtues for this guild (community) doing
these particular things (practices). Character is shaped by a certain
collection of virtues, hierarchically
arranged, and virtues are gained through habits
((e;qoj), which, in turn, are acquired through repeated actions (Aristotle, NE, 2.1). In addition, there
is also an artistic feel, gained over
time, for a given trade. So, there is a
difference between mere practices and
good performances of those
practices. Virtues of character are
acquired through early habituation of
one's desires, feelings, pleasures and pains (NE, 1104b11, 1179b24). To a
large extent, ethics is like a craft in requiring these features of an
apprenticeship. So, too, mission
practices can be discussed with these same categories (in italics).
The NT barely uses the word 'virtue'. Paul speaks of 'righteousness' or the 'fruit
of the Spirit'. Perhaps 'virtues' that
one gains by oneself take too much emphasis off of what God accomplishes by his
grace in us through Christ and the Spirit.
Jonathan Edwards spoke of this work of God in terms of an
'awakening'. And yet 'righteousness' is
not immediate: there is progressive sanctification as well as an 'already/not
yet' aspect to Christian living between the first and second coming of Christ
(cf. Phl. 3.12ff). So, how do Christians
'train in godliness' (1 Tim. 4.7--here: teaching, example, Scripture reading,
use of a gift for the church; cf. the 'theological virtues' of faith, love, and
hope--e.g., 1 Th. 5.8)? How do they
develop 'holy or religious affections' (Jonathan Edwards: 'If we take the
Scriptures for our rule, then the greater and higher our exercises of love to
God, delight and complacency in him, desires and longings after him, delight in
his children, love to mankind, brokenness of heart, abhorrence of sin, and
self-abhorrence for it; the more we have of the peace of God which passeth all
understanding, and joy in the Holy Ghost, unspeakable and full of glory; the
higher our admiring thoughts of God, exulting and glorying in him; so much the
higher is Christ’s religion, or that virtue which he and his apostles taught,
raised in the soul' (Thoughts on the
Revival I.II.I))?
Narrative ethics emphasises the importance
of living in community to be able to
visualise the embodiment of that narrative.
Role morality notes the
importance of taking on a role within a community in order to learn, improve,
and be shaped by the community's expectations and needs from one in that
role. Paul struggles with misunderstandings
by others about how to define his apostolic role, preferring to understand this
not in terms of 'leadership' but 'service', because the model for his ethic is the crucified Lord, Jesus Christ.
*What
sort of apprenticeship is required for mission practice?
*What sort of
education in virtue is needed for our children so that they develop as
apprentices in mission? What action
steps will we need to take to train children and youth in Christian virtues
over against an increasingly hostile world to Christians that also entices us
its own attractions?
*How do we learn
to practice (as in craftsmanship) love, forgiveness, reconciliation? How does mission practice place us in the
role of apprenticeship in these virtues (or put us at odds with them!)?
7. Practices. Craftsmanship is about the practice of a
trade, with the understanding that there is an art to each trade. When speaking of a Christian interest in
'reconciliation,' e.g., we may be concerned about troubled spots on the globe
or broken marriages and relationships.
Yet there is more than an interest in the same product at stake in
ethics: much of ethics is about the way in which this particular people practices
what occupies them. Narrative ethicists
such as Stanley Hauerwas are concerned to describe the practices of those in
the peaceable kingdom of God. As
Christians concern themselves with reconciliation, how will Christian practice
of this differ from what others mean by the same term? One example, whether lauded or derided today,
is that of the medieval Catholic penitentials laying out a way to practice
reconciliation to God and the church.
This involved sorrow and repentance, acts of contrition, forgiveness,
absolution, restoration--more than just saying 'sorry.' A Pauline understanding of reconciliation
involves one's relationship with God: he did not expect those outside Christ to
practice it (e.g., Tit. 3.3-7; Eph. 2.1-10).
Ethics has to do with understanding not only how a community's narrative
outlines a unique virtue ethic but also how a community's practices help
develop and demonstrate these virtues (e.g., love and the practice of
forgiveness, reconciliation, hospitality, humility).
*Mission practice is an ethic: what sort of people are we
becoming in the practice of our mission?
(An extreme example might be the workaholic missionary who has little
time for his family!) How does this
practice relate to the narrative and virtues of our Christian community?
Bibliography
Aquinas, Thomas. Summa
Theologica.
Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics.
Birch, Bruce and Larry Rasmussen. Bible
and Ethics in the Christian Life. Rev. ed.
Grenz, Stanley, J. The
Moral Quest: Foundations of Christian Ethics.
Hays, Richard. The
Moral Vision of the New Testament: A Contemporary Introduction to New Testament Ethics.
Hauerwas, Stanley. A
Community of Character: Toward a Constructive Christian Social Ethic.
Hauerwas, Stanley. The
Peaceable Kingdom: A Primer in Christian Ethics.
MacIntyre, Alisdair. Three
Rival Versions of Moral Enquiry.
Wilson, Jonathan R. Wilson. Gospel
Virtues: Practicing Faith, Hope and Love in Uncertain Times.
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