Since penning the opening article in this series, considerably more evidence has come to hand of the great upsurge in Roman Catholic circles of claims to have the gift of tongue-speaking. One Catholic paper has reported.[1]
“The Catholic Pentecostal Movement, which has gained over 200,000 followers in America in five years and is spreading fast in Britain, held its first major ecumenical conference in England. Catholic priests and nuns, and clergy and clerical students of all denominations and many nationalities, were among the 230 people at the conference, most of whom joined in charismatic prayer and witnessed instances of ‘speaking in tongues’ and ‘baptism of the Spirit’.”
In June this year the Australian Catholic Truth Society released a booklet entitled, “Pentecostal Catholics”[2] This booklet opens with a statement made by Pope Paul VI in 1966:—
“If we really love the church, the main thing we must do is to foster in it an outpouring of the Divine Paraclete, the Holy Spirit.” It then declares: “The Catholic Pentecostal Charismatic Movement (now called the Catholic Charismatic Prayer Movement) is one of the ways in which the new upsurge of devotion to the Holy Spirit is expressing itself in the church today.” The booklet traces the development of this attitude as beginning in two U.S. Catholic Universities in 1967 and then reports, “It came to Australia about two years later. From the universities it has spread to parishes, to convents, to monasteries.”
The Catholics appear to be in a hurry to make up for lost time to match the impact this movement has had in the Protestant sphere. Thus all the main Churches appear to be giving in to the Pentecostal delusion, just as their forbears did to the Evolution delusion a century ago. It is the Writer’s conviction that those who cherish the truth of the Scriptures could well be sorely tested in this problem before our Lord comes. One calls to mind the Master’s words, “For there shall arise false Christs, and false prophets, and shall shew great signs and wonders; insomuch that, if it were possible, they shall deceive the very elect.” (Matt. 24:24)
We suspect that many readers might now be thinking, ‘This thing is so obviously not of God, it would have no chance of deceiving any Christadelphian.’ If that is so, we hope you will continue to read carefully, for we strongly suspect that the appeal of this “wonder” is more subtle than we realize.
We live in an age of practical materialistic thinking. This climate of thought is giving religious belief a severe buffeting. Religion, to most people, is intangible. Faith is caricatured as believing in something you can’t prove. Men want proof, tangible proof for everything. The theories of the Evolutionist are allegedly tangible — religion is not. In these days of “instant” living, the appeal to “search the scriptures” —to study and to think — falls on dull ears. Men in search of God look for something more dramatic and “real” to indicate His presence. This does not just apply to non-thinkers either, as witnessed by the philosophizing of Philip Toynbee (son of the famous Historian, Arnold Toynbee) who wrote recently,[3]
“Even my own very tentative assumption of God’s possible existence does begin to illuminate man. Under this belief he makes more sense than he did before…
“In so far as I can even begin to conceive of God, he seems less and less like an omnipotent creator —more and more like the leaven of the world in one aspect; in another, a magnetic star outside the world but drawing the world towards itself…”
“And so they go on — on and on and on — these helpless speculations. I pray as best I can, though I have very little real understanding either of what prayer is or of what it ought to be. I go to church occasionally. I meditate — except that this is too grand a word — almost ceaselessly. I have never received even the faintest direct intimation of God’s presence…”
To be fair, Toynbee goes on to observe that he knows perfectly well “that to complain of this silence would be fatuous” — but the point to be seen in this quote is the search for God, however timorously undertaken, is focussed on the possibility of some physical manifestation, as the only real proof. This seems to be indicated again when he further observes, “I simply lack the experience which might have made me — might, suppose, still make me — into a religious man.” He gives no comment whatsoever on the Scriptures or his attitude towards them; however, he views “Christian orthodoxy”, by which he mainly seems to mean Catholicism, as being “not only irrelevant to what I was trying to find, but positively repugnant and obstructive.”
Now we must move our observations back to the Pentecostal sphere; and there we find a strikingly similar attitude of mind. Similar, that is, in the predisposition to value “experience” as the supreme element of proof in “knowing” God. Those who have professed some form of Christianity for a number of years and who are then won over to Pentecostalism always make this observation a principal feature of their comment, whether spoken or written.
The well known singer, Pat Boone, was for many years associated with the Churches of Christ, but recently he was won over to Pentecostalism after reading Wilkerson’s book, “The Cross and the Switchblade”. He and his wife now profess to speak in tongues and have other gifts of the Spirit. Dr. James D. Bales, a Church of Christ preacher, has written a book[4] which very critically examines the whole matter of Pat’s “conversion” and the tongue-speaking question. In his correspondence and conversations with Pat Boone,[5]
“Pat said one of his troubles was that much of his view of Christianity was doctrine only — a set of rules. This had not worked for he still had problems to which he had no answers. Pat said that before he was baptised in the Spirit,[6] ‘my Christian life was too much effort. He spoke of others, now ‘Spirit-filled,’ who ‘had known the emptiness of dedicated, but human, Christian service…’ This baptism of the Spirit was ‘a whole new dimension, and I wanted it! I wanted everything that God had for me! I was tired of trying to do it myself’. Pat wrote that, before his conversion, ‘witnessing was an embarrassing affair, especially among my show business friends, and I felt a need to prove I was no square, that I could fit right in anywhere between my Church World and my Career World!”
Do we expect service in the Lord, in this life, to produce all the answers? Are we not to work out our “salvation with trembling and fear”? Did Jesus promise an easy path? Doesn’t the Lord “chasten”? Are we not to experience “heaviness” at times due to “manifold temptation”? Let us not be bewitched by the “spirit” manifested by Pentecostalism, as Pat Boone and others have been, by trying in the wrong way to fulfil desires to “feel” contact with Divine things. We do not see anything wrong in itself with desiring to “feel” towards God. It can be a very healthy spiritual state of mind, see for example Psalm 42:1-3. But just as man does “not live by bread alone” neither does he live by “feelings” alone — however pious, “but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God” (Matt 4:4 rsv).
These “confessions” of Pat Boone spotlight some sensitive areas in our own attempts to truly reflect the spirit of the first century ecclesias. Do we project, for example, the BASF as a set of rules? Can we be guilty of driving some of our number to the boundaries of the fold because we have failed to adequately cultivate a balanced family who really set out to rejoice together? The Great Apostle wrote, “Rejoice in the Lord always; again I will say, Rejoice”. Have no anxiety about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:4, 6, 7 rsv) Do these verses have real meaning in our ecclesial life today? Discounting present frictions — did they have real meaning before then? We must wake up before it is too late, and realize that we cannot have a healthy vibrant ecclesia when we feed solely on the letter of the Word.
Pat also wrote, that before his “conversion” he was ‘more or less a typical Christian: the kind that is determined to be good, no matter how miserable it makes him!’ However, he went on to say that ‘it is not accurate to refer to myself as miserable, but that he had ‘too little joy.’ He compared his changed life to the change from black and white TV to colour TV and wrote, ‘We are living in colour now, with power and peace in our lives that does surpass understanding’. Pat claimed his tensions were gone, he relied on the Lord. This is a thought which is echoed again and again by the writings and spoken comments of those involved in this Movement. The present Writer recalls a work associate who was a Protestant lay preacher, who, some years ago, was courting for a while a girl who was a fervent Pentecostal. He commented at the time on her remarkable serenity.
What can we say to these things? The present Writer has had reason to exercise his mind on these things for the past six years. It has not been easy to come to grips with this problem. It has caused much inward reflection. The earnestness and sincerity of most Pentecostals cannot be denied. But they are very difficult people to reason with. As the saying is, the man with an experience is never at the mercy of a man with an argument. In developing the reasoning which demonstrates that there are many things in the tongues movement which do not tally with Scripture and the state of things in the first ecclesias, the Writer has been sometimes acutely conscious of how far short our community comes in relation to the vibrant spirit and intimate fellowship of the early believers.
Sources
[1] Appeared under the heading “Seeking the ‘gift of tongues’” in ‘THE CATHOLIC LEADER’ (Brisbane) of 20/8/72
[2] Written by ‘Rev’ T.A. White of the Catholic Enquiry Centre Sydney and quoted in the issue of ‘NEW LIFE’ of 7/9/72
[3] JOURNEYS IN BELIEF pp. 220-223. This is Book 2 of the Unwin Forum Series
[4] PAT BOONE AND THE GIFT OF TONGUES, published by the author himself, Dr James D. Bales.
[5] Ibid, pp. 240, 275-6
[6] Portions in single quote marks are from article by Pat Boone in TESTIMONY No. 30 pp. 7-8,10, an American Pentecostal magazine, and quoted by Bale pp. 326, 339.
The Solution