HOW DOES GOD SPELL PROPHIT?

Poor God. He has a terrible time trying to make himself understood. His troubles are compounded when he uses the crazy English language. When he says, “My son will rise” he means Jesus. But some could have interpreted it to mean, “My sun will rise”, and they began looking at the eastern horizon!

The Bible is often referred to as the “voice of God” in the “words of men”. God’s expression is limited by human comprehension, hence subject to misinterpretation. His language of love is reduced to cold print. When the teachers of religion propound that message, it gets further compounded.

As I’ve said already, this is aggravated in the English language. Here is another example. The preacher says, “You must be a prophet”. The congregation, seeing the luxurious lifestyle of the preacher interprets it as “You must be a profit”; something oft propounded by tele-evangelists and advocates of the prosperity gospel. Does this metaphor sound bizarre? Is the church in India a truly prophetic, or profitable venture?

Fr Josef Neuner SJ, in his book “The Prophetic Role of the Laity” describes a prophet as one having the following attributes: 1. He speaks in the name of the living God 2. The message is addressed to actual situations (specific and existentialist) 3. He is confronted by the powers of evil 4. His only weapon is the word of God 5. He does not live for himself; God has taken possession of his life.

To what degree can we Christians say that we are fulfilling our prophetic role? Does our message come from God, or our own pet theories? Is our message situational and contextualised, or vague and idealistic? Do we experience opposition from evil or well entrenched forces; or are we well accepted, invited to grace occasions, and offered the high seat at the table/ dais? Is our faith our strength, or do we rely on institutional, financial and political power? Finally, are our lives consumed by God, or are we living a consumeristic life? Should we proclaim, “The prophet is dead. Long live the profit”?

The profit’s philosophy of life is to live and let live. Don’t interfere, maintain the status quo, don’t rock the boat, keep your house clean and throw the garbage on the road for somebody else to collect. Have faith in your own resources, climb the ladder using others as rungs, avoid situations of responsibility and pass the buck.

Should we blame God for not having spelt prophet correctly, or are we ourselves to blame, for turning a deaf ear to his word? Do we think that the biblical concept of prophet is obsolete?

For that we need to go back in time to understand the prophetic office. In the Old Testament the three pillars of the chosen people were the Priest, King and Prophet. This troika finds repeated mention in the New Testament, and also in Vatican II teachings. We have already seen Fr Neuner’s definition of Prophet. He describes the King as entrusted with political guidance, and the Priest as responsible for instruction and worship. I would recapitulate these three roles in the following simple terms: the Priest makes the rules, the King actually rules, and the Prophet interprets the rules in specific circumstances.

These three functions are also the foundation of modern democracy. The Legislature that legislates or makes the rules, is like the Priest. The Executive that has the power, resources and governance in its hands, is like the King. The Judiciary that interprets the law in a given situation, is like the Prophet. For a healthy society it is important to have all three functions separated and clearly defined, with no encroachment on each other’s domain. What happened during the Emergency, when two wings of Govt were subjugated to the executive? It was a ruthless and insensitive dictatorship, in which the poor suffered the most. India is yet to emerge from its shadow.

A fourth pillar has emerged in modern society, appropriately called the Fourth Estate – the Press. When the Judiciary or Legislature is suppressed, the Press assumes the prophetic office of being conscience keeper to the nation, and a barometer of its health. When this also fails, then the fifth sinister option emerges. In World War II they were referred to as the Fifth Columnists – the undercover operatives, who conveyed their messages though advertisements in the fifth column of newspapers. In peacetime such operatives are either terrorists or extremists, who see violence as the only solution to perceived injustice. They will stop at nothing. As sociologists teach us, violence is the option of those who have nothing to lose.

What of the church in India? Who exercises the legislative/ teaching/ priestly office? Quite rightly the hierarchy. Who governs the church, its institutions, finance, aid agencies, and even what has to be announced from the pulpit? The clergy and the hierarchy. Who adjudicates on what is right and wrong, even in peoples’ bedrooms? The hierarchy. Who controls the Catholic press, and determines what should or shouldn’t be printed? To a large extent the clergy and hierarchy again. What is this if not a totalitarian regime?

Herein lies the danger. There are those who will say that the church, being a divine institution, cannot be compared to a democracy, or based on democratic principles. Rev D.S. Amalorpavadas, that great champion of the laity, had a counter point, that the church is more than a democracy, it is a community. And a community cannot function as an autocracy. Should we be prepared for the fifth columnist, who is bent on grabbing power by any means available? Do we want a repeat of the French Revolution?

However, Catholics have for centuries been docile, and our Indian psyche is one of tolerance, so we react somewhat differently. We become indifferent, complacent, or abandon ship – an exodus. Grandiose, but empty churches in Europe, bear mute testimony to this. The number of sheep stolen by smaller sects, with more personalised religion, from the monolithic Catholic Church, is increasing.

How do we remedy this? By restoring parity and clarity in the social structuring of the church, with each being true to their particular office or vocation. Let the clergy/ hierarchy put their heart and soul into their actual role of instruction and worship. The laity must assume control of the temporal affairs of the church, and be the spokesperson and torchbearer of the community in public life. We don’t want clergymen being appointed to political office, including various Minority Commissions. Lay organisations must build on their own strengths and resources. Funding agencies should be removed from the domain of the hierarchy. The Religious Orders and Congregations also need to emerge from the shadow of the hierarchy, to exercise their prophetic office, at the service of the word and the world. The Catholic press, in like manner, must be given far greater autonomy, and the laity need to evolve their own media strength.

When the scale is tipped in favour of one side there are only two ways of restoring parity; either decrease one scale, or increase the other. Power is never surrendered gracefully, and I don’t see a violent upsurge in the church. So the only option open is to strengthen the role of the laity in the church. It’s a long haul, but there is little choice.

Perhaps this piece will be a small step in that direction and will inspire or strengthen somebody to hear God’s invitation to the prophetic office; to be a voice in the wilderness, preparing the way of the Lord. The words of this once popular hymn are apt for the prophet.

It takes courage to answer a call
It takes courage to give your all.
It takes courage to say
What you know will not pay;
To be standing alone
One who no one will own.
It takes courage to be true.

Spellings may differ, but this, I believe, is how God spells Prophet.

THE FIVE SHOPKEEPERS

It was business as usual in the marketplace. Shopkeepers were opening and cleaning their shops, as customers began trickling in. Each shop had a signboard vying for the customer’s attention. This is about the Five Shopkeepers.

The first shop’s sign was -ATA. The first letter had fallen off, and the shopkeeper hadn’t bothered to repair it. The customer looked at the board and wondered. Was it BATA selling shoes, TATA selling tea, or LATA selling music? Confused, the customer moved on.

The next shop was called TOUGHNUT HARDWARE. Being a computer geek, the customer entered to see the latest hardware. To his consternation he found it stocked with very different hardware – nuts and bolts! The customer realised that connotations change with time, the same word meaning different things to different people.

The third shop was called MADHUSHALA (a place for honey). Hoping to get some pure honey the customer dashed in, only to discover that it was selling country liquor, as Madhushala is a misnomer commonly used in north India for such dens. Names can indeed be deceptive and misleading.

Fourth in line was a posh, air-conditioned SUPERMARKET. Many well-heeled customers were going in. However, this particular customer was rather poorly dressed and felt intimidated by the grand ambience. The shop looked too expensive. In trepidation, he walked on.

The last shop in the row was called the ROSERY. At last, here was something nice. He could pick up a bunch of sweet smelling red roses for his dear wife. Alas, this too was not to be. The shop had no flowers. It was selling religious articles like holy pictures, statues, and ofcourse, rosaries. The customer felt a twinge of disappointment. But he liked the peaceful atmosphere of the religious stall. While leaving he couldn’t resist requesting the shopkeeper to please spell ROSARY correctly.

The customer had reached the end of the row of shops, and he was empty handed. A waste of time, an exercise in futility. Are there lessons to be learnt from this shopping expedition?

There is a school of psychology called Transactional Analysis, which applies to inter-personal relationships. In like manner a shopkeeper-buyer contact is also a transaction. In the aforesaid instances we find that the customer was looking for something that he didn’t find, despite the initial attraction of the external signboard. Each transaction was different. As a businessman of many years experience, I can vouch with authority that sales and marketing are all in the mind. The classic 4P’s in sales are - Price, Product, Placement and Publicity. What went wrong in these transactions? In the case of –ATA the carelessness of the shopkeeper left the customer bewildered. HARDWARES’ definition and understanding had changed. He was out of sync with the times. MADHUSHALA was deliberately misleading for those not in the know. The SUPERMARKET was an overkill, its very strength becoming its weakness. The ROSERY was just slightly off the mark. But then so often in business, sports or life itself, a hair’s breadth is all that makes the difference between winning and losing. Going off on a slight tangent can result in a wide margin of error.

So we need to analyse these transactions. Sometimes the product was wrong, sometimes the price, the placement or even the publicity (projection). Can we now juxtapose these shopping transactions on the church? Is our product selling? Is our placement correct? What about our pricing, and finally what is our publicity or rather public image (projection or common perception)?

For this we need to use another management technique – of backward integration. In this case we need to employ the principle of cause and effect. From the effect, let us work backwards to the root cause, just as a doctor diagnoses a disease from its symptoms. So what image does the church project? What message is it giving? This can be ascertained from what people are coming to us for. I won’t go to a Bata shop to buy tea, or a Tata shop to buy shoes.

I recall a missionary priest bemoaning that people only came to him asking for money, and the principal of a convent school lamenting that people only came to her for admissions! Such admissions (pun intended) are revealing. They are telling us that indeed that is all that we have to offer. Conversely we may ask, “How many people come to us asking for spiritual solace, healing or peace? How many come seeking refuge from injustice or strife?” We cannot generalise, but the answers could be revealing.

We must learn from the mistakes or misrepresentations of the five shopkeepers. Even a minor error like the spelling of Rosary had a negative impact. So too many good and zealous Christians don’t cut much ice in society for minor errors – be it in language, dress or liturgy. A small change could make a big difference.

From projections (exterior image) we could move to internal dispositions. We will again apply the process of reverse integration for a proper diagnosis. Where there is sugar, the ants will come. On the other hand, as Jesus said “Where there is a corpse, there the vultures will gather” (Mat 24:28). Are we sweet sugar (amrit), or a stinking corpse? Are ants or vultures attracted to us? Ants are always seeking, hardworking and communitarian. In contrast, the vultures are lazy, selfish and greedy, always on the lookout for a kill. If our constant refrain is that our people are lazy and greedy, then we are castigating ourselves; that we are a corpse, devoid of the Anima Christi. We are far from being Corpus Christi, the living body of the resurrected Jesus. Food for thought – for ants or vultures? Double entendre!

Let us get our price, product, placement and publicity correct. Let us be wise shopkeepers. In today’s market economy only the best will survive the competition. So too in the economy of salvation, there is no more protectionism or exclusivism. Sell or sink.