Christians started the YMCA in 1844, primarily influenced by the British Christianity of their century, but also unequivocally inspired by Christ Jesus.
Out of all the miraculous accomplishments of the YMCA in the almost 18 decades since it was founded by Sir George Williams and 11 fellow Christian businessmen, one of the most enduring and crucial is its bringing together diverse Christians from across the globe to love, care and serve together in their communities.
You could say that the Y is at its best when it participates in the transformation of a community where once there was the withering of human solidarity and together with Christians and fellow citizens they worked diligently towards flourishing for all.
To do this requires very different kinds of Christians who were nourished by a variety of Christianities to not just get along, but to humble themselves in response to the prayer of Jesus in John 17, to repent of the ways they misrepresent Christ Jesus, and renew their spirits towards union with the Son of God, a communion which is empowered by the oneness of Father and Son.
It would take a miracle for Christians from different countries and cultures, different languages and customs, different dimensions of diversity to experience unity, it would take the Spirit of Christ himself to not only change our hearts and minds, but cast a vision in our spirit for working together as his Body in the world.
Thank God for all the times this has actually occurred in our past!
But when Christians in the Church and the YMCA forget their history, when they disparage their past, when they neglect the events that precipitated their current circumstances, they undermine their ability to fully discern what is actually happening in their midst, they get foggy about why it’s happening, and then get unclear about where it might all be headed.
Renowned philosopher Terry Eagleton, in his review of the life and influence of American-British playwright and poet T.S. Eliot, puts it like this:
Terry Eagleton: “The Pope of Russell Square” Commonweal magazine
“For his part, Eliot understands that the past is what we are mostly made of, and that to nullify it in the name of progress is to annihilate much that is precious. It is thus that he can write that by abandoning tradition, we loosen our grip on the present.”
When Christians in the Y know little about George Williams and his eleven friends, when they know barely anything about the marine-missionary Thomas Sullivan or the former slave turned preacher and YMCA leader Anthony Bowen, when they barely recognize the name of Luther Wishard or John Mott, what wisdom do we have to work with to navigate the choppy pluralistic waters we sail through today?
When Christians in the Y barely know our history, our victories and failures, our cultural successes and blunders, our social impact and detriments, we fail then to learn from our past, we cut off our ability to do better as Christians in society, and either end up repeating similar mistakes, or make worse ones unknowingly.
A brief analysis of the YMCA in the USA reveals an organization that is both fully shaped by our American culture, but also one that has profoundly shaped it as well.
Amongst all the cultural realities that are in tumult, one of them is the health of the family, thus also the vitality of neighborhoods, the commonwealth of a community, the nurturing of an inclusive social order.
The YMCA is an association, amongst other realities, and is always navigating the dynamics between individuals and groups, branches and associations, CEO’s and boards – and in an effort to appeal as widely as possible in an inclusive way, it struggles to say something definititively about itself as a Christian-rooted non-profit organization while trying not to turn anyone away.
It can get stuck between the philosophy that “everyone may believe more or less what they want” – which can lead to a kind of moral nihilism, or it can get stuck against the values of majority status quo without fully caring what it means or how it can negatively affect the minority.
Christianity in the YMCA has an internal source of critique when it overidentifies with individual aspirations or with groupthink, a well of criticisms for when Christians get out of hand with their bigotry towards anything different or apathy towards injustice: it’s Jesus Christ, who claims to be the way, the truth and the life.
The more that Christians in the Y pay attention to Christ, they will have access to both nurtuing truth and wisdom on how to lead and serve in a withering set of circumstances, critical practices for building up peace amidst conflict and thus capacity for adding resources that build up a flourishing life for all.
Eagleton remarks again, via Eliot, in this regard:
“A belief in social order need not be authoritarian; it may rather be an alternative to the anarchy of the marketplace. It may also be preferable to a liberal civilization in which everyone may believe more or less what they want—but only because convictions don’t matter much in any case, and because the idea of human solidarity has withered at the root.”
Terry Eagleton: “The Pope of Russell Square” Commonweal magazine
When Christ is made central to Christians in the Y, they can easily join in the critiques of all that is witheringly wrong with Christianity in the YMCA and America.
But, as we all know, it is all to easy to generate criticism – so the real task is: can we join Christ in telling the truth with grace, can we constructively criticize ourselves, not in self-loathing but in a spirit of love that begins to reconcile, make amends, and build anew a healthy spirit mind and body for all.
Jesus says in the Beatitudes: blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled. Another way to translate it: blessed are those who hunger for equity, for justice, for what is good and beautiful and true.
To hunger for it means there is an absence of it, which means there is much to critique; but, in Christ we also have a source, a set of prayers, a way of life to imitate for responding to the criticism with humility, wisdom from the past, and traditions to draw on to do better.
Out of all the actions the YMCA can take to re-position itself for the future in this post-pandemic world, one of them that I consider vital is to take stock of its Christian roots, to re-remember it’s Christian heros, to start telling a truer origin story, to let it’s rich vibrant imperfect history be a source of brilliant wisdom on what not to do anymore, what to keep doing, what to adapt, and what to start.
Is there anything else like the YMCA in our nation? No.
Is there anything else like the YMCA in the kingdom of God? No.
We who are blessed to be members of the YMCA in these days are part of a movement that is unique, is powerful, is audacious, is a walking miracle.
In these days where the “idea of human solidarity” is withering at its roots, may the YMCA be energized to act upon the call that God has been placed upon it to live out our full mission in every city where we are present, fueled by convictions that matter, to participate in the answer of the Lord’s prayer “that they all may be one.”
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