The association of religion with power and money has always been bad for religion, doubly so for Christianity. You’d have to admit the Catholic Church has been one of the most powerful institutions in the whole of world history. So hostile opinion sees Catholicism as fair game because it’s strong and powerful.<\/p>\n
The last word on this ought to belong to the Methodist preacher, Dr Colin Morris. Something he said 25 years ago stuck with me. “The Gospel cannot be preached from the strong to the weak,” he said. This was John Wesley’s objection to the mighty Church of England of his time, when he founded Methodism. The Latin American liberation theologians are saying much the same about the Catholic Church there.<\/p>\n
Jesus was a political outcast and itinerant preacher with neither power nor wealth, who got on the nerves of the powers-that-be to the extent that they had him done away with. What Colin Morris meant was that even if you came up with technically the right words, the mere fact of them being uttered from the pulpits – or radio stations – of the strong and powerful meant they weren’t the Gospel. If you’re rich you can’t expect to be listened to when you say “Blessed are the poor.” In this case the medium is the message and so the message is wrong. And that’s a Gospel truth all the Churches need to see from time to time when they look in the mirror.<\/p>\n