by Edward Hutcheson

The recent admission by the Pastoral group that they should have approached their fellow Pastor before coming out against his stated position, finds its root in the Matthew 18 passage, that gives clear outline on how such “faults” should be handled within the Christian church; but  the fact that Pastor McPhee is in the place of being right is really a “technicality”, brought about by the grace of God. His admission that he has received sponsorship for his sailing sloop over the past ten years brings up the question of him “qualifying”, for such substantial backing; he does not support gambling, but he sees nothing wrong with accepting financial support from an entity that makes its money from gambling?  I do not think there would be a problem if the “contribution” went directly into work of ministry, but. The casual observer would have no problem in seeing him as “doubleminded” in the biblical sense. When Jesus Christ gave the command to the religous folk of that day to “render unto Caesar, the things that are Caesars and to God the things which are Gods”, he was speaking to the religious leaders also, who had a sneaky habit of trying to trip Him up with “socio- economic-political concerns”. Historically, Pastors or Churches have not done well trying to use their influence to work these three “pre-occupations” at the same time, but the new “economic paradigm” coming into play with how gambling proceeds can be used for “good”, may have some Pastors doing some things that a watching public and congregations would find questionable.

I do not doubt that there are other persons doing stuff illegally, who drop off some serious money at their favourite church or social organization, but  I do not think they go out of their way to make themselves known and the money is not always  traceable back to them, and I do not think that these social organizations or churches give this money to the police; they use it. There is talk of a referendum and this is good, but until there is a revisiting of the Anti-Trust and Conflict of Interest Laws in our nation we will only be beating our gums. We may not have a “number problem” at all, just a lot of people realizing that this is the new “cash cow” that everyone is trying to get a handle on, but our lackadaisical attitude to the formulation and enforcement of the Constitutional machinery has been the bane of our existence over the past forty years in particular.”Een no law fer us!”

We should not be too hard on the Pastor, because he is working out of a well-worn paradigm that many of us contemporaries find as acceptable. Pastors, Priests, Apostles, Reverend Gentlemen and many Clergy have had a problem with the social dynamics that come into play when they face the problems that they and their congregations confront every day, but most of them make the mistake of checking with their Prime Minister, Member of Parliament or some other source before they check with God. And it is on this point that I close. Pastor Mcphee’s offer to Government about the 10% is nothing new, and it does not even come close to what some churches give to the community every month, in the way of  the President of the Christian Council made the same offer to Prime Minister Pindling in 1973, before or after Gambling was legalized in some hotels in the Bahamas. The offer was not accepted then, who knows if it will be accepted now. One problem, Pastor Mcphee is speaking for himself. It is said that there was a point after the main “discussion” in the Autumn of 1973, where some of the Pastors intimated  to the Prime Minister that Pastor R.E.Cooper and Cabinet Minister Carlton Francis, “were not speaking for them”. It is ironic that almost forty years later we still have a problem with who is speaking for who, who should be speaking for who and who is conspicuously silent.

The Church has a responsibility to speak with one voice on this particular issue, because it is not just about gambling. This is what you can call a “gateway issue” for all of the other freedoms that sanctioned beings feel that they are entitled to. If one vice is legalized it sets a legal precedent for whatever else we would want to express our freedom about, and the fact that gambling is not mention specifically as a vice in the Bible makes the argument “philosophical”; and that aspect has not even been mentioned, yet.

July 18,2012