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Tony Jones on Mark Driscoll: What came first, the thug or the theology?
This drawing is inspired by the Ouroboros Snake... of the snake eating its own tail.
What came first? The chicken or the egg? What came first? The thug or the theology? I read Tony Jones' thoughts on Mark Driscoll.
Jones has always admired Driscoll, maybe envies him a little, wants the best for him, believes he can be redeemed, and suggests that things can be restored.
What I found most interesting though is that Jones believes the problem with Driscoll is theological.
- He titles his post is "Thoughts about Mark Driscoll"
- He talks about the "heady" days of publishing and speaking.
- He dismisses his disturbing personality traits by his use of the word "sure".
- He says it isn't a moral issue (evil) but that he is passionate.
- He says more than once that Driscoll is "extremely smart" or "brilliant".
- He suggests that he will "see" (as in "think"?) his way out of this.
- He writes that Driscoll has just embraced a toxic version of theology.
- He hopes that Driscoll will turn away from this toxic theology.
- He concludes therefore that Driscoll is not the problem, but his theology.
But my question is‚ What came first? The thug or the theology?
That is, did Driscoll become the focus of concern because of his theology? Or was it because of his behavior?
I'm concerned that Jones' post reflects the refusal of the church to understand spiritual abuse. It neglects the pathology of its abusive leaders. I don't think this is being fair to the victims or the perpetrators of spiritual abuse. People are victims of not just a bad theology, but a pathological cruelty.
I don't think Driscoll's theology made this happen. Driscoll "embraced" his toxic version of theology because it aligned with his moral compass. It fit his personality. It worked for him to achieve his goals. Then it manifested the worst in him. Then he continued to develop his toxic theology in order to make more room for his pathological behavior. Mars Hill Church too.
Jones' sentence, "It could have happened to any of us." is true, because I believe we all participate in this dynamic. Theology is our creation. It is a reflection of our drives and desires.
Then, not satisfied to only be the product of our drives and desires, it also becomes the producer of them. Theology is a vicious cycle of our desperate need to understand and control our universe.
Step into this cycle at any point and you can see that we are both the root and fruit of our theology and pathology.
And yes, it spins out of control by manifesting itself in toxic, controlling, and abusive behavior. Nothing can be done about bad theology because of free thought and speech.
But we can do something when this manifests itself in bad behavior. Cruel theology is a nuisance. Cruel behavior is unacceptable.
When Driscoll thinks bully to his people, we can say please stop. But when he actually bullies people, we can step in and say you will stop now!
I don't think this is a theological issue. I think it is a pathological one. Not just for Driscoll and Jones, but for the entire church.
If we would be healed, our theology would take care of itself.
1079 comments
Dear Mike Morrell,
THANK YOU! I forgive you completely and I am happy to move forward with you and the TLS community. God is good. That means a great deal!!!
Sincerely,
Your friend Julie
Mike, thanks for apologizing – that and a few other comments slipped in while I was getting long-winded.
I think the issue here is that although the conversation(s) was/were private, their impact went beyond that private scope… they had a public effect, and they had an effect on people who were not privy to the private exchange. Just bringing it all out into the open is a wise move for all concerned, so thanks for that.
ps. I wanted to click “Like” on your apology, but I didn’t like what you said about my friend Bill. Generally I only call him bombastic privately ;-) and at least partly in jest. But I do really appreciate your addressing Julie here.
@Lost, @Rose, others:
Julie is right about talking about it, telling the story. “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you.” (Maya Angelou). I would add that when it’s a story of personal destruction, or devastation, telling the story is the path to healing. You’re finding people now who have been through it as well… keep talking.
@Julie, @Bill,
By my recollection, Mike Morrell encouraged me to back off on anything confronting Tony about the situation outlined in this thread. This was back in late 2009, around the time Tony’s book on The Didache came out. I reviewed that book and said good things about it, but with the knowledge of what was going on behind the scenes in EV. At that point I hadn’t had as much evidence presented to me, and although I tended to believe the story already, I decided to split the public theology from the private behavior when I reviewed The Didache. I sanitized some of the private material when I commented publicly disapproving of Tony’s new marriage theology in early 2010 http://subversiveinfluence.com/2010/01/well-2010-is-unorthodox-so-far/ It wasn’t long into 2010 when my steam ran out for blogging on the emerging/missional church altogether, but I had already issued a prediction for what the next ten years would bring http://subversiveinfluence.com/2010/01/the-decade-ahead-for-the-emerging-church/ and in looking up some of the back-story links just now, I found that Emergent Village doesn’t even seem to have bothered to keep the .com domain name anymore. (For the record, my intention is to leave my dormant site online for archival purposes so that I won’t contribute to anyone else’s link rot and so that anything I said then can stand as it was written in the day. I’ve got nothing to be ashamed of, and there are things I wrote that people still find helpful.)
As I remember the times in late 2009 and early 2010, EV had book tours going on for Everything Must Change and the Church Basement Tour thing. Back in April 2009, EV was already broadening some of its discussion about the future of EV with some leaders who weren’t part of the original EV founders or current board members or coordinating group members or whatever. They gathered a bunch of people up for meetings one weekend to chat. The new group was made up of people like Julie Clawson, Tim Snyder, Makeesha Fisher, Sarah Notton, Amy Moffitt, Mike Stavlund, Troy Bronsink, Michael Toy, Brittian Bullock, Kelly Bean, Eliacin Rosario-Cruz, Anthony Smith, and others… something like 20-25 people which I believe include Brian Mclaren as well as Tony and Doug. I’m fairly confident that some of those people were later used to spread the “Julie is crazy” rhetoric, but I don’t know or can’t say who or when or in what fashion. This is the kind of tactic that Todd Hiestand brilliantly apologized for above, and for which Mike Morrell is being called out above. I honestly don’t think that most people at that level of EV leadership at the time knew the whole story, or knew that they were being used to shutdown calls for accountability. As I saw/see it, they had the wool pulled over their eyes too, like so many of us have had in one way or another. (For clarity, I’m not saying that about all the people mentioned here, nor intending to accuse any of them… just pointing out that they were a pool of people to draw from in repeating a message later on in 2009 and 2010.)
wrt NPD-afflicted persons (I just couldn’t call them victims or sufferers like for a normal disease, because they’re the inflictors of those adjectives.), I have some comment to make. NPD or Narcissistic Personality Disorder is a form of pschopathy for which the standard test is called the DSM-IV. More is coming to public light about these types of people now and much is being written, but I do recommend Snakes in Suits by Ron Hare and… somebody with a “B” name, and thank Bill Kinnon for first recommending the book several years ago. There are a lot more resources now to help recognize when you’ve fallen prey to someone like this. Not all psychopaths go around killing people…. some get jobs as CEOs or megachurch pastors. After my own experiences with people of this type and after my reading on the subject, my position is that even if such people are repentant and wish to change, they should not be placed in ministry positions again. Never. Not. Ever. And no, there are no what-if’s, and no exceptions. While I fully believe that God can heal and can change people, I believe quite strongly that any such person who had changed enough would deeply and sincerely eschew any type of position that would give them that kind of power or authority again. If they don’t fear it, they haven’t changed. So no. NPD and other pschopathic ailments are found in the fundamental makeup of the brain and are not simply cured by starting to give them some kind of nonexistent empathy drug. For these reasons, my position is that those who exhibit these tendencies or have shown them clinically in the past should not be in ministry. Period. And those who still are should be removed, for the safety of all those they lead. And as far as I’m concerned, the culpably-knowldegable defence network around them should step down as well, because they knew the good they ought to have done to protect others, and chose to ignore it.
I’m convinced we’ll find there are many others who were used for this purpose and didn’t know it: it was unwitting, not wilful. For the most part, those are the ones who won’t have any difficulty with issuing an apology.
Hi Julie (and all) – even though I thought this was private between me and the ones I offended, I now see that my comments (part of them, anyway) are public. I responded to you privately earlier today, Julie, but I’m hearing that it’s important to you that I bring it up publicly to help bring resolution:
I’m so sorry that I called you “batshit crazy” in that private correspondence four years ago, Julie. That was my expression, and I own it. It’s doubly-regrettable given http://mikemorrell.org/2010/07/tears-for-fears-my-anxiety-and-modern-life/ my own mental health struggles – a sad turn of phrase that speaks to then-unresolved self-loathing, I think.
Please know that I went on no such “campaign.” I was responding to one blogger who, in my judgement, was being bombastic and self-righteous – a self-appointed Victim Watchdog whose tone back then was very different than David’s, now. I was triggered, and in the heat of that moment, had an email exchange with him. Things escalated; we both said regrettable things; we both apologized.
I never apologized to you, though. Looking back, I suppose it’s because I thought that a conversation between the two of us stayed between the two of us; he’d even assured me of such. Apparently, he lied. But none of this detracts from the wrong-ness of the way I expressed myself. I’m so sorry.
There are people… leaders… who privately contact me to either manage, control, or stop this conversation. Nakedpastor has never censored comments. I mean, I have interjected now and then to try to inject my point of view as another participant in the conversation. But never to shut it down. Well… I did shut down a couple people who were either extremely misogynistic or Islamophobic or something. But in this case, these are the comments of people who are telling their stories. And my take is that it is mostly challenging a movement and its leaders or representatives. I find it interesting… don’t you?… that the voiceless are speaking here on this post while the “leaders” use back channels. This says something to me.