THOUGHTFULLY DRIVING THE PORCELAIN BUS

A Column by John S Schroeder

May 18, 2002

"Incrementalism," "Slippery-Slope" what ever you want to call it, the idea that one action, that is not so bad, can begin a trip to a very bad place is as old as time, and is often dismissed. Usually when the argument is brought forward, people respond by saying things like "Well surely people will be able to distinguish between this and the stuff you are talking about -- after all you can." And yet, the social/behavioral history of my lifetime is a testament to this argument. As I look at my lifetime, I am absolutely convinced the Second Law of Thermodynamics applies to human behavior as well as physical systems.

Let's take the example of divorce. I do not think any but the completely and irrationally dogmatic would state that divorce should never happen. There are circumstances where divorce should happen. Similarly, any decent, compassionate human being would think that if someone were divorced we, and particularly the church, should help that individual cope with those difficult circumstances. And yet in this nation we reached a point just a few short years ago that one-half of the marriages ended in divorce. I do not think any thoughtful person could reasonably argue that that many divorces fell into the "should happen" category. Somehow, that first step of "some divorces are OK" has led us to a place where divorce is no big deal, and the church, by supplying support to the divorced, makes it easier to divorce.

I believe we humans are fairly dogmatic by nature. If one examines the state of liberalism in the country today, it has taken on the aura of a very strict dogmatism. Those that disagree do not need to be argued with, they are simply dismissed, because once an idea rises to the level of dogma, defense is not necessary. There are a lot of reasons why this happens, but for purposes of this discussion it is really only necessary to establish that we tend to polarize and think dogmatically.

Once the tendency to dogmatism is understood, slippery-slope arguments make much more sense. It is much like magnetism. Once one steps away from a given pole, the attraction of the opposite pole begins to be felt, and without the exertion of a significant amount of counter force (which most people do not make the effort to do) one will eventually end up attached to the other pole. This is even truer for a social system where the energy to overcome the attraction is much, much greater.

Thus, even seemingly arbitrary rules make sense -- they do not necessarily guard against the thing they prohibit, rather, they guard against the thing after the thing they prohibit.

I find this particularly true in church settings, and particularly true in my flavor of church -- Presbyterian. We "Presbies" have a lot of rules -- a whole lot of rules -- a warehouse full of rules -- we have rules to interpret the rules -- and then we have rules to make sure we can't misinterpret the interpretation rules. The reason is fairly simple. Presbyterianism was founded to guard against some things; primary among them was the establishment of a "priesthood," save the priesthood of all believers.

Calvin, Knox, and the other founders knew that the source of much of the corruption that required them to cleave from Rome was rooted in the power that was granted to the priesthood and the papacy. They argued, rightly I believe, that all people individually have direct access to God. Hence there is no "preeminence" in making decisions about the church, and so Presbyterians have chosen to govern themselves in a republican fashion. This then is the source of all the rules -- to define, and more importantly limit, the powers and authorities granted to the various office holders.

Have you ever noticed that the more dictatorially governed churches, Pentecostalism for example, generally have more scandals, ala Jim Bakker, Jimmy Swaggert, et. al. Note also, that those scandals are generally the result of the one having so much authority and power that they can get away with stuff.

Thus, as a Presbyterian, and as a Presbyterian office holder, one of the things that I am charged with is knowing, following, and enforcing the rules. This is not always easy. That great horde of rules often acts simply to prevent things from happening and that can get very frustrating. One can become very tempted to shortcut the rules, just to get something done. It is not unusual in a Presbyterian Church for a rule to be circumvented by "mutual consent." Where it gets tricky is when mutual consent is assumed rather than affirmed. When that happens the person making the assumption has truly gathered more authority to himself or herself than they rightfully have, and thus the trip down the slippery slope has begun, even if they acted with the best of intentions.

Things can get even more complicated when it is likely that mutual consent would have been granted, had it been sought. But then that is losing sight of the issue, the issue is not really the particular circumvention of some rule, but the fact that an individual unilaterally chose to do so, violating the very essence of how a Presbyterian Church is supposed to be governed. It is very difficult to know what to do in such a circumstance.

Once in my life, I believe I was too lax in enforcing the rules -- not in the Presbyterian Church but in Young Life. I have told the story before about the leader that circumvented the rule that no male leader should be alone with a female kid. You know the rest.

Many have accused me of a certain inappropriate zeal in following and enforcing "the rules." I don't think so. I just don’t want to slip down the slope.